Cites & Insights: Opinions desired

It's the interregnum between volumes of Cites & Insights, and also the end of current sponsorship. That's a natural time to play with the layout of the publication (postponing, for now, more substantive issues such as the future of the publication).

So I'm interrupting the series of introductory posts on But Still They Blog: The Liblog Landscape 2007-2009 (thanks to the multitudes who've already purchased it, and I hope he or she will enjoy it...) to invite reader opinions on a possible change to C&I.

Berkeley Book or Constantia?

For the last five years, Cites & Insights has used Berkeley Oldstyle Book as a text face (with Berkeley Bold for boldface, since Berkeley Book doesn't have a bold version and "bolded" typefaces are inherently ugly). It's one of the most readable serifs in the business; my alma mater knew what they were doing when they commissioned the typeface from Goudy nearly a century ago.

But it's also very much a book typeface, a little light on the printed page.

I've become quite fond of Constantia, one of the typefaces introduced by Microsoft along with either Windows Vista or Office 2007. I love the traditional non-lining nature of its numbers (to me, they're much easier to read than modern lining numerals). I like the overall flow of the typeface.

But it's heavier than Berkeley Book--and sets just a little wider as well.

What Do You Think?

I plan to make a decision before I produce the January 2010 issue (most of which is already written). I'll need to decide by Friday, December 18, since I plan to produce Volume 10 Issue 1 around December 21.

So here's the deal:

• Take a look at the Constantia version of Volume 9, Issue 13.


• Compare it to the published Berkeley Book version.


• Yes, they're both PDFs; there's no other way I could show you Berkeley Book, since that's a licensed typeface (paid for, not transferable to other machines).


• Tell me which you like better--send email to waltcrawford at gmail dot com.

One important note: The Constantia version is three pages longer...but part of that is because I wanted to generate a quick test, which meant not going through the issue to do copyfitting (e.g., tightening the text in some paragraphs to eliminate a one-word last line). I'm nearly certain that copyfitting would bring that down to 34 pages and possibly to 33 pages--it will require a little more space, but not as much as you see here.

So: Opinions?

Oh, and if you know of a possible sponsor...that would be even more appreciated.