There is an organization, whose name I cannot recall, that is running a campaign for sites to prevent access by users of pre-4.0 browsers. I can definately see the point of this, as past a certain point, it’s ridiculous to continue to cater to the needs of a few people who refuse to adopt newer standards. However, I think something like PNG would do it for us. Everyone would have a better experience if PNG were the web-standard image format (faster loading pages, better looking images), except the few who use 3.x or older browsers. And those people would finally have a reason to upgrade:)
Black background: I use it because one of the features on my webpage is my artwork. A black background allows a better contrast for the artwork to be seen than a white background does (in my opinion). Since I don’t edit it after scanning - and since I hate working with colors - it’s always a B&W image on a white background. Ergo, surrounding the total image in black makes the white look whiter… which in turn makes the image itself look sharper and crisper.
Further, I’ve felt that the dark background allows for a more “laid-back” feel (surprise, not everyone who uses a black background is trying to be “gothic” or “creepy”).
I know ya need the ads to pay for the site but do ya have to put them over it so i have to watch them and wait for the dumb llittle commerical to play out to get to the box to click off ?
You see these usually on places like game spy and the like with a kid/teen demographic
White text on black background - GOOD GOOD GOOD!!!
Man, I’ve been getting into arguments over this recently, and I supspect it’s a holdover from classic print design days.
First of all, research studies in the 60s and 70s (which I’ll cite if you need me to) determined that on CRT screens, viewers preferred white text on black background rather than black text on white background. This research was done to determine the best format for subtitling films. In the beginning of the research, black on white had a slight preference, but by the end, white on black was preferred for CRTs.
I’ve personally always found it easier when working on computers that white or green on black are far more legible. Remember the old green monochrome screens? Or the DOS command line?
There’s also a reason for this. Now, conventional typography discourages white on black. Why? It’s print typography. When you have a black background, the ink gain bleeds a little bit into your letters, so a 9-point type will look smaller and more illegible.
With black letters, the ink bleeds out into the white background, making fonts look the right size.
CRTs are opposite. For all intensive purposes, white is our “ink” now. So white text on a black background will bleed out, whereas the white background will glow a little into the black text. Of course, as with ink, if the letters are too small, the dot gain may render your letters illegible.
I whole-heartedly agree with you on all the other points.
This is why I am changing mine to white. I’m tired of being called a goth and not taken seriously. 
I have read about the higher legiblity of black on white, however it doesn’t “feel” so nice to my eyes. Maybe they’re conditioned to white-on-black from books/print, but white-based sites just have a sense of openness, space and brightness, whereas black-based are just closed in and void-like.
I can understand the use of black for artistic reasons. But depending on your font size, you mabye should consider bolding all text for increased legibility.
The J Train, Western Civilization’s Ultimate Respository of Wisdom and Insight, uses white text on black. I find it far easier to read than corresponding amounts of black on white, and the only complaint I’ve ever had (with just over 1300 hits since I changed servers) was from people who tried to print stuff.
Dr. J
White text on black background is better on my eyes than looking at a bright white background with black text.
All that brightness just hurts my eyes.
Of course worse than that are the morons who use flourescent colors like safety-orange as th background.
OW.
Nothing to add to this except to point out to Caught@work that those Demotivational images on your site belong to Despair Inc. (www.despair.com) and unless you have their permission, you’re violating their copyrights.
DoctorJ - Yes. I forgot to add that very good point. The one problem with white text on black background is that when you go to print, most browsers are set not to print background colors. Your white text then gets rendered on a white background resulting in, well, an empty page.
It’s good to see some support finally for white text on black!!!
Hooray!
Woah ! So that’s where they came from. They were sent to me in a mail and I didn’t even think to consider they were part of someone’s money making business.:eek:
I’ve pulled the page. I don’t want to stop anyone making cash from such a great idea. I just didn’t think. (Where’s the smilie for I’m such a dickhead?)
I’ll make up some of my own in the near future such as:
VISION:
When you look up to see the stars, there’s a greater liklihood of a bird shitting in your face.
(Not perhaps as good, but I love these types of thoughts).
Sorry for the hijack. Back to the rant.
Which is a shame, since I love your webpage layout. I’m going to keep my webpage design, but mostly because I’m too lazy to change it.
I don’t mind most color schemes on the 'Net - aside from “orange on green” or “purple on slightly-lighter-purple”. White-on-black, black-on-white, or my own scheme, dark yellow on black… it’s all the same. Personally, when I’ve been sitting in front of a computer for a long time, my eyes get tired and prefer to look at a black background… white can be glaring (it’s also probably because one of the other message boards I frequent uses a black background, and I get used to it after an hour).
My biggest webpage layout peeve has been the “Packed With Java” syndrome pages… where someone found every single possible javascript on the ‘Net and integrated it into his or her webpage somehow. I have one script… the good ol’ “onmouseover” script. I’ve toyed with the idea of adding more, but no… I keep my webpage layout very simple. At the top of every page, I have a single, relatively small title image, and then the content (photo gallery, art gallery, story gallery, what-have-you).
Heh SPOOFE… great page, I never noticed it before. I love the graphic on the front page. 
I personally love my design, but I’m trying to make money here, and it’s just not happening the way I need it to. If lightening the site up helps, then so be it. I’m still going to be using hand-drawn elements in the graphics, so it won’t change too much.
I think chique will like it. 
Oh come on, I saw that, like three years ago.
This is going to sound slightly more snarky than I actually mean it - but, Why?
It’s 6 years old, not slightly older technology, but very very very much older technology. It’s free to upgrade it. FREE. It isn’t as good as the upgrade. There are times that I can see holding onto older technology for various reasons (including cost, quality, personal attachment) but I can’t think of a single reason to not dump IE3. I can think of many, many reasons not to have IE3 in the first place (I’ve never designed a website that I couldn’t navigate on Lynx) or to choose some other browser, or even to wait around for a couple of bug fixes before upgrading to the next browser, but it is time to let go of IE/NS3.
I actually like white on black text, it’s easier on my eyes than black on white (or so I think.) What I cannot stand are people who specify the text color, but fail to specify the background color or vice versa. Finish the design! Don’t make me have to spend time trying to figure out what color I’m going to need to change my background/text to in order to read your site. Do the whole thing.
I have a crappy computer (I said I understand holding onto old technology) and if the popup ad that loads when I go to your site either shuts it down or threatens to do so if I don’t take immediate action, I’m not going to think highly of the site and return. I’m definitely not going to buy anything from the advertiser.
Well maybe some people don’t know that it’s free to upgrade.
(There are people who know very little about this and just like to play around with what they’ve got).
Some people think a 19Mb file to download it just too much
trouble over a 14.4 modem.
Some people are comfortable with what they have.
I mean I didn’t buy a HDTV when they came out, I’m happy using my that’s 10 years old. Ditto with a 3.x browser.
Some people don’t want to change and really that’s their choice.
Of course, if you want to put stuff on your site that they can’t see, then that’s your prerogitive, but they may not like it and they can go away.
Hey, it’s the same for everything. I don’t like the colour of your shop, so I won’t come in.
But as long an you appreciate that point, then of course you can choose to ignore them.
I’m not demanding that you cater for 1.x browsers, or 2.x or anything, just don’t demand that I use PNG 'cos someone likes it better than a GIF.
I know you’re not demanding personally, but there are other that are demanding, and I get to choose what I do, just like you get to choose what you visit.
Caught@Work makes a good point about 3X browsers.
I know A LOT of people who would break into a sweat before they’d download software and upgrade. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” is what they’ll think. Also, how much HD and RAM does a 4x browser require, compared to a 3x browser? With the crappy little 386 laptop I used to have (I gave it to my aunt) it only had 4 megs of RAM. Enough to run a 3x version of Opera, but nothing else. Many people have these kind of computers - old and creaky and on the edge.
Some people are given old crappy computers. They can’t afford anything newer, or they can’t afford a computer at all, which is why they are using creaky old hand-me-downs. They sure as hell can’t afford to upgrade their hardware. I have friends like this. I don’t see them buying a new computer any time soon, and they SURE as hell don’t know how to upgrade software OR hardware.
And in the case of IE 4, I remember it on my first PC. It was a RAM hog, a HD hog, and once it had its clutches into Win95, it was hard to remove. I had a definite love/hate thing with IE 4, and at that time, preferred IE 3.
The PC I bought in the summer of '96 came with Netscape 2.01; I didn’t upgrade for two years, until I began noticing more and more sites that wouldn’t display correctly or crashed the browser.
Good point. My site has popups, but that’s because I’m hosted on Tripod (no money at the moment to register SPOOFE.com). I could get an anti-popup javascript, I’m sure, but like I already said… I like to keep the scripts on my page kept to a minimum.
Maybe when I get a real domain name I’ll put a bit more effort into site building (write all the HTML by hand, for instance, instead of using a WYSIWYG).