"...Copy, art, typography should be seen as a living entity; each element integrally related, in harmony with the whole, and essential to the execution of an idea..."

This line exquisitely captures the gist of what we all should be thinking about when planning and building a web page.

The focus of this exercise is to do a cursory review of Internet typography.

First off, typography in general has one overriding motive. That is readability. If it's not readable then it's not good typography.

Physical scientists who needed a standard way to share information created the hypertext mark up language. They didn't give a hoot about typography or the graphical display of the document.

So the key components of typography, such as tracking, leading, and kerning were never considered.

With that in mind, I'll begin by looking at HTML typography from the following standpoints:

  • Readability - and how it relates to the tradition of good typography.
  • Issues affecting HTML Typography - such as control, browser and platform conflicts.
  • Some hints for Writing For The Web.
  • And some links for you to find out more about typography.