# Do you use a non-standard font in a professional context?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-use-a-non-standard-font-in-a-professional-context/690492>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [June 10, 2014, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-use-a-non-standard-font-in-a-professional-context/690492 "2014-06-10T19:13:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![SpeedwayRyan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce7236/32.png) [@SpeedwayRyan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpeedwayRyan)\
**Post date:** [June 12, 2014, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-use-a-non-standard-font-in-a-professional-context/690492/41 "2014-06-12T18:53:15Z")

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I’m a graphic designer (art director, technically) so sure, all the time. But if “non-standard” means “Comic Sans and Papyrus,” then no, never. 🙂

The only time I use the faces mentioned in the OP are when typing emails, where I use Calibri.

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**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\
**Post date:** [June 15, 2014, 12:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-you-use-a-non-standard-font-in-a-professional-context/690492/42 "2014-06-15T12:06:02Z")

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This mess is a pet peeve of mine. I do technical work in industry and I frequently present. A typical scenario is that my PowerPoint slides are going to be inserted into somebody else’s presentation and I’m going to run up to the podium to speak with no idea what setup the presentation computer has and no opportunity to test in advance.

I’ve learned to use Ariel for isolated lines of text, Times New Roman for multiline paragraphs (the serifs help eyes follow the lines), Courier New for text that needs nonproportional spacing, and Symbol for characters that don’t exist in the others. I have learned the hard way that straying from these four is asking for trouble. It is a BIG DEAL in technical work when substituting a locally available font for one that was unavailable can actually change content and meaning, sometimes into some other plausible but incorrect meaning (because computing scrambled fonts and character sets and several related concepts together into a big unpredictable mess).

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