PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

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madmax
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PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by madmax »

Since there is a lot of people who still don't get it:

Instant chats in capital letters are less readable.


Exhibit A: http://www.wmich.edu/wmu/writing/typography.html
Perhaps the most frequently violated rule of readability involves the use of ALL CAPS (capital letters). (...) Your brain does not recognize words solely on the basis of specific letter combinations, but on the overall shape of the words. In fact, your brain recognizes whole phrases based on letter shape rather than identifying individual letters and words.
Exhibit B: http://www.eric.ed.gov/ERICWebPortal/se ... o=ED355497
(...) lower-case printing is much more legible than all-capital printing due to the fact that lower-case letters have more character in terms of variation in shape and the contrasting of ascenders and desenders with short letters. (...) Thus words formed from lower case letters have unique outline patters, and familiar words can be read as a whole, while all-capital letters have no distinctive patter and slow down readers.
Exhibit C: http://uxmovement.com/design-articles/a ... rs-to-read
Text in all caps greatly reduces the shape contrast for each word. In fact, the shape of any word put in all caps for all fonts, either sans-serif or serif, is a rectangle. This means that the words in all caps have only one parallel edge at the top and bottom of each word, giving it no shape contrast. How­ever, words put in title style capitalization often have a shape of multiple adjacent edges at the top and bottom, giving it high shape contrast.
So yeah, DEFENSE DOWN! is worse than defense down!.

That is all.
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syllabear
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by syllabear »

madmax wrote:So yeah, DEFENSE DOWN! is worse than defense down!.
actually both are wrong, it should be "defence down"


Joking aside, if you get used to certain combinations with your teams, thats just as good
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INW
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by INW »

syllabear wrote:
madmax wrote:So yeah, DEFENSE DOWN! is worse than defense down!.
actually both are wrong, it should be "defence down"
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Desolate
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by Desolate »

I know who this is directed towards. Thanks for the info Max.
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by Hoax »

I konw rhgit, lweor csae is mcuh eieasr to raed

unless you use caps in a dark colour that has a white background!
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by sinewav »

Sticky.
Concord
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by Concord »

I'd imagine that Defense Down is the best, as the capitals clearly show the change in word.
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Lord Pein
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by Lord Pein »

Well, I think this is a little debatable. A message in all caps with 9001 colors reading "DEFENCE IS DOWN!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ^$#^%$@&&%&%@&^%@&^%$ DEFENSE DOWN!!!#@%$#^@&#%&$@^$" is much more noticeable than "Defense is down," so if it got spammed out quickly, or you are not paying attention to chat (for whatever reason), seeing the giant, colorful, long message would indicate that something of importance happened (or someone is just spamming).

However...

Not all caps: readability
CAPS: noticeability
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INW
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by INW »

Good point. I normally don't even read the instant chats. Usually green means good and red means bad. Except for that one kid who has them reversed...
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by LucK »

INW wrote:Good point. I normally don't even read the instant chats. Usually green means good and red means bad. Except for that one kid who has them reversed...
yea same. I hate when people have green for everything because then I have to actually read it :(
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by Titanoboa »

sinewav wrote:Sticky.
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madmax
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by madmax »

Desolate wrote:I know who this is directed towards. Thanks for the info Max.
This isn't directed at someone in particular, it's just something you see everyday :P
Concord wrote:I'd imagine that Defense Down is the best, as the capitals clearly show the change in word.
Good point.
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Desolate
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by Desolate »

Well considering I said DEFENSE DOWN! GET BACK! almost every round during the cafe tournament as Gonzap centered, it was reasonable to think it was directed towards me :P
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Jip
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by Jip »

I only look for red or green text - i dont read it at all :P
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Re: PSA: Instant chats in capital letters are less readable

Post by apparition »

Just changed mine from all caps to first letter capitalized only. Thanks Max!
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