alt Hacker NewsNo. It’s stupid. There’s a reason we don’t write white text on black paper. There’s a reason the first Mac showing black text on a white background was such an improvement.
I don’t get the point at all (and don’t want to hear it, I’ve seen the arguments before).
It’s nice it’s there for people who want it but it baffles me it’s constantly treated like the greatest thing ever.
Replies
> There’s a reason we don’t write white text on black paper.
Because wood is bright and you can’t really print white ink on a black paper?
There might be a usability advantage but using black ink on white paper doesn’t really prove that, that’s just the easier option of the two possible choices.
Notably, also the Xerox Alto was black on white already.
> There’s a reason the first Mac showing black text on a white background was such an improvement
Apple soon started offering a dark mode as an accessibility feature https://kalleboo.com/linked/mac_closeview_control_panel.png
> No. It’s stupid. There’s a reason we don’t write white text on black paper.
That being that black paper is more expensive than white and that we're stuck with historical precedence?
Reading white text on a black background is much, much easier for me, and the few times I've had the pleasure of doing the same with paper, I still found it to be better. I haven't tried longer texts, since nobody's publishing actual books with black paper, but I'm willing to bet it I'd feel the same about those.
This just reads to me the 'serifs are important because they make reading easier (when reading of paper)', which doesn't reflect my lived experience at all. The only reason these phenomena seem to exist are historical accident and people being used to them.