Set in Style

Here’s how the heading for this client alert (a PDF file) appears on a computer that doesn’t have a particular font installed:

Whoever produced the alert (probably) imagined that the heading would appear like this:

Here’s how some of the body for the alert appears on that computer:

Whoever produced the alert (probably) imagined that the body would appear like this:

What went wrong? Whoever produced the alert made a common mistake. He figured that if the alert looked good on his computer, it would look good on all computers.

How to avoid such a mistake? Simple. Just embed required fonts when you create the PDF version of an alert. How? Here’s how.

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If your firm claims a commitment to excellence in all it does, don’t blow it by publishing alerts that are so far from excellent. That makes it seem as if your firm’s staff doesn’t know how to use common computer applications; they don’t pay close attention to detail; they don’t take pride in their work; and it makes the attorneys who authored the alert seem careless — as if they don’t bother to look at published versions of their work.

I just reviewed this client alert that (not which) was published by Winston & Strawn. It has some good qualities, and some not-so-good qualities.

What struck me first about this alert was the typography. While most firms make the mistake of setting body copy in a sans-serif face, Winston & Strawn’s alerts have a much more professional appearance: heads are set in a sans-serif face, and the body copy is set in a serif face.

The second thing that struck me was the complete lack of hyphenation to justify the copy. (For some reason, law firms just don’t like to justify copy the way the professional publishers do.)

The third thing that struck me was the verbiage at the bottom of the alert. To obtain the alert, I simply clicked a link at the firm’s Web site. So it seemed very odd that the verbiage offered me a way to stop receiving alerts from the firm.

Right above that verbiage was this curious comment:

If you would like to review your contact information, please click here.

I clicked the link, and the following appeared:

We’re sorry, but something seems to have gone wrong:

The contact and event information could not be decoded.

If you got to this page by clicking on a link in an email, then the link information in the email may have been split across two lines.You may be able to copy the link from the email and paste it into your browser.

OK. The firm thinks it e-mailed the alert to me. So I did this simple test. I clicked the firm’s logotype at the top of the alert, and guess what? Nothing happened! (Had this alert been produced by pros, the logotype would link to the firm’s Web site.)

I went back to the firm’s Publications page and clicked the PDF icon for the alert, and guess what? The PDF version of the alert is an HTML file!

Just for the heck of it, I chose to view the PDF version of another alert*, and guess what? No links at all! Not even to the firm’s Web site.

Winston & Strawn’s a firm with some chutzpah: it claims it’s one of “the most technologically advanced law firms in the world.” It’s alerts say otherwise.
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* In a tribute to the days before the IBM Selectric became so popular, that alert uses underlines, rather than italics,for emphasis.

Recently, I’ve had a number of conversations about typography, and typesetting legal documents. Some (e.g., Kenneth Adams and Si Daniels) dispute the idea that serif type should always be used for body copy because it is more legible than san serif type.

The United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit, has sided with the traditionalists by adopting this comprehensive set of rules for typesetting briefs.

According to the court:

Studies have shown that long passages of serif type are easier to read and comprehend than long passages of sans-serif type. The rule accordingly limits the principal sections of submissions to serif type, although sans-serif type may be used in headings and captions. This is the same approach magazines, newspapers, and commercial printers take. Look at a professionally printed brief; you will find sans-serif type confined to captions, if it is used at all.

The Supreme Court of West Virginia goes in a completely different direction with these rules:

Except by leave of Court, all pleadings and briefs, including footnotes, must be in at least 14 point type, must use Courier, Arial, or Verdana font, and only one side of the paper may be used.

Go figure!

Consider the following snippet from this recently published Intellectual Property Update:

Notice the spacing between the words in the next-to-last line.

Now, grab a newspaper, or a magazine, or a book: anything published by a professional publishing company. Scan the right-hand side of a column of fully justified type. Notice that hyphens are used to break some lines. This eliminates giant gaps between words (which tends to annoy readers).

If the firm that published the Intellectual Property Update relied on a production editor to produce the update, the above snippet would have been set like so:

A big deal? No. Just another detail. And a convenience for readers.

Most plepoe can.  

And most people can read this:

Gevin teh wya we raed, the oerdr of the ltteres in wrods dseno’t mtaetr. Waht’s iproamtnt is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer are in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it. Tihs is bcuseae poeple don’t raed each leettr invidiudally, but eahc wrod as a wlohe.

And you tghuhot corerct slpeling was so ipmorantt!  

Now, if you work in the marketing department of a large law firm, and you’re responsible for the design or production of your firm’s client alerts and newsletters, you might find this exercise instructive:

Make a copy of the garbled text (above). Then, set it alone on a page. Set it in 14-pt type, and a column 6 inches wide (there should be 6 to 8 lines of copy).

On one page, set it all upper-case; on another, set it all lower-case; on another, set it mixed-case in Times-Roman; and on another, set it mixed-case in Arial.

Then, do a survey. Stop coworkers in the hallway and ask them to read one version or another.

Do they prefer to read garbled copy in the serif face, or the sans-serif face?

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There’s a good reason why professional publishing companies almost always set body copy in a serif face, rather than a sans-serif face and that’s because it’s easier to read.

(Go to your local bookstore and browse through some magazines and books published by the pros; you won’t find much body copy set in a sans-serif face.)

Now, take a look at your firm’s client alerts and newsletters and ask yourself this: why in the world are youy setting body copy in a sans-serif face? The pros don’t do it, so why should you?

When you find the answer, please let me know (by commenting below).

Years ago, when Apple’s Macintosh made it possible for the masses to become typesetters and page designers, the pros laughed at the ransom-note nature of the results. The masses were mixing and matching typefaces and design elements in a way no well-trained typesetter or artist would, and the results were often hideous.

Now, the masses are designing Web sites and blogs and — once again — many of the results cause the pros to cringe.

So . . . if you’re setting type (say, for your firm’s client alerts) or you’re designing Web sites or blogs, you might want to get hip to why the pros consistently do things the way they do.

One good source is Usability News, published by the Department of Psychology at Witchita State University.

Here are a few articles that the marketing folks at big law firms might appreciate:

On white space and readability

On line length

On the use of serif and sans-serif fonts

For some reason, lots of Big Law firms like to use itsy-bitsy type for their Web sites. This is odd, because tiny type — hard as it is to read — tends to repel, rather than attract, readers.

Why would any publisher (law firm or otherwise) do such a thing?

Consider the intro to Winstead’s IP practice description:

Compare the above to the intro to Thelen Reid’s IP practice description:

It’s no contest. Thelen Reid’s copy is much easier to read than Winstead’s.

Sure, anyone wanting to read copy at Winstead’s site can crank up the type size in their browser (and then crank it back down when they go to another site), but why make anyone go through the effort?

Here’s a tip to all the Big Law firms that use tiny type: consider your readers, and what’s most convenient for them.

Consider the following snippet from a newsletter recently published by a Big Law firm:

Consider the first sentence under the head:

Companies and individuals are becoming increasingly conscious of their carbon footprint—a measure of carbon dioxide emissions, which are believed to contribute to global warming, attributable to their activities.

And note the use of a single em dash to set off the parenthetical expression (i.e., a measure of carbon dioxide emissions, which are believed to contribute to global warming).

The problem here is that an editor didn’t bother to review this newsletter before it was published. Had an editor reviewed this, an old rule would surely have been applied: one to separate; two to enclose.

(more…)

I was reviewing amicus briefs for United States v Williams when I found something interesting.

Compare the type from this brief prepared by Winston & Strawn:

To the type from this brief submitted by the American Center for Law & Justice:

It looks like Winston & Strawn — which claims to be “among the most technologically advanced law firms in the world” — doesn’t know how to set type quite right, or doesn’t care to.

Some very good advice to attorney-authors who want to be read and respected comes from Daniel Oppenheimer, Ph.D., professor of psychology at Princeton.

In his paper — “Consequences of erudite vernacular utilized irrespective of necessity: problems with using long words needlessly,” published in the journal of Applied Cognitive Psychology — Dr. Oppenheimer reiterates what few attorney-authors can believe: readers consistently judge the writer who uses plain, clear language as more intelligent than the writer who arranges obscure terms in convoluted constructions.

And there’s some good advice for law firms that use Arial for body copy: readers judge text set in a hard-to-read face as being written by less intelligent authors.

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Professor Joseph Kimble — professor of law at the Thomas M. Cooley Law School — offers similar advice, specifically addressing the benefits to lawyers of writing for readers.