IdolHands.com :: Days in the Life of an Alpha Geek
Danger: Helvetica
Following a lead embedded in a recent post by the intrepid Scott Beale at Laughing Squid, I came across a great series of educational films from the BBC. While I opened my brain to soak up knowledge on topics ranging from the mysterious properties of water to Britain's strides in calcium reclamation (via conveniently located drop boxes for unused teeth and bones), I was alerted to a dire phenomenon known as the Helvetica Scenario.
Donning my investigative journalism hat, which I keep right next to my political wog hat, I came to an alarming discovery: in the 7 years since the BBC first mentioned the dangers of Helvetica— which it dismissed as a "very, very rare occurence"—, the menace has made the leap from calcium atoms and humans to the Web itself. A quick search on Google revealed that Helvetica is lurking in the cascading style sheets over 15,000 web sites, and in fact almost every Mac and PC includes some variant of this terror.
What is perhaps most alarming, however, is that aside from a recent mockumentary horror movie exploring the nightmare that is Helvetica, almost no attention has been paid to this phenomenon. So, in an effort to raise public awareness, I have created a set of warning labels suitable for printing onto sticker paper. Please download the file and keep a stack of these stickers on hand at all times. If you see Helvetica in the wild, do your part for public safety and apply the sticker in a visible location.
The print-ready file is available here:
danger-helvetica.pdf.zip (52k PDF)
Astute typographers may note that the sticker itself uses Helvetica, but I can assure you that this particular variant has been neutralized and poses no danger.
Helvetica Warning Sign by Corey Ehmke is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
UPDATE: You might want to check out the Danger: Helvetica gear over at the Idol Hands store.
Comments
Dr. Kenneth Noisewater
February 3, 2009 at 9:45 AMBTW, a quickie 3Kx3K PNG render with alpha transparency for cafepressification: http://www.thoughtcrime.com/images/dangerhelvetica.png Look Around You, and do your part!
