This has kinda been covered

http://www.typophile.com/node/29708

I second Patty’s motion. Lets not have another one of those conversations; I already had to send a flaming email to some gibbering Marxist at Cranbrook this morning…

”...what you [people] think is social responsibility in our job?”
There was another thread, previously linked to from this thread, that discusses s.r. in general graphic design, but that thread, though it ranged from Sinatra and the Pharaohs to Ethics and the CIA, left little room for type. I think, in general, responsibility has more grip on g.d. where the end result is “in sight”.

Different kinds of responsibility may be found throughout the spectrum of type design, from those working on complex systems of fonts for the typography of rich but unseen documents, to those working on the perfection of the letters for a single word they know all too well. Are you talking about type design, or graphic design?

”..how do you bear this responsibility (if there is such a thing) in your daily work?”
I don’t purchase print products as much as possible. I force myself, activity by activity, to use digital alternatives, improving them and propagating appropriate improvements to others as much as I can along the way.

“Are there (historical) examples, that (kind of) support your arguments?”
What argument? :)

Cheers!

’The social responsibility of an [x]’ topics that seem to pop-up seem to not really depend on what [x] is. Isn’t social responsibility universally social responsibility regardless of what particular industry/product one is in?

It means not designing custom fonts for Monsanto, Halliburton, or Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign.

Isn’t social responsibility universally social responsibility regardless of what particular industry/product one is in?

That depends on whether or not one sees morality as relative or absolute. And more often than not, the answer is probably going to be no.

“That depends on whether or not one sees morality as relative or absolute.”

Right. The question depends on one’s opinion of that statement...not what one does for a living.

First – thanks to everybody!

David – you’re right, now that I saw the other thread as well it might be wise, to either close my thread (like James kinda suggested) or to push it into the type-direction. To me the latter would be more satisfying, since the “end result” will actually be type. To give it a try – Gerard Ungers Gulliver is an attempt to create a typeface, that is economic. In other words it safes paper and thus trees. Behind it’s design there was that “ecological” concept and out of this idea Gulliver was born. I think this is an example what social responsibility COULD be... What do you think?

@ aluminum. Of course – everybody is socially responsible. But how does this manifest in your/our work. Do we as typedesigners or typographers have an impact?

Oh! And thank you very much patty for showing me this interesting thread. I really was looking if there is allready something but did not find it... Wrong keywords I guess. Thank you very much!

I think this is an example what social responsibility COULD be... What do you think?

I think that before you start worrying about what it could be, worry about whether it exists at all. Read up on Immanuel Kant and Ayn Rand’s ethical systems—deontology and objectivism, respectively—and then start to think about social responsibility again. Ethical notions really don’t have much value without some kind of solid foundation underneath of them.

Quite apart from Gerard’s motivation for Gulliver, type designers have been trying to cram more words into less space and make it look bigger from day one.
So you have to separate intention from effect from bullshit (pardon me, I mean marketing).
Is it really responsible to hype the newest biggest Airbus as being environmentally friendly?

Something else to consider is the difference between environmental responsibility and self-preservation. In other words, I don’t recycle because I care about polar bears, penguins, the River Ganges, or my (potential) children. I do it because screwy weather scares me.

James: the screwy weather scares the polar bears, too.

Thanks Nick – that would have been my next question. The intention and probably a need for this – let’s say invention – are relevant. Otherwise one can interpret social responsibility into everything.

@ James – Hahaaa :-) Nice said! And of course true... Of course its a big difference between responsibility and “survival” but the effect is probably the same. In other words, I don’t care WHY people care about the environment – as long they do. Jared Diamond wrote this very nice in his “Collapse”. He had to work with some global players and they had other motivations than penguins and polar bears – so he had to argue on another level but the results were quite remarkable. Thanks for the reading suggestions – I’ll check that out.

@Alaskan – Social responsibility could also mean to teach those polar bears swim long distances, preferably southwards... But I guess the penguins wouldn’t understand this as very social responsible... :-)

Thanks a lot!

I have not read “Collapse” yet, but I’m planning to do so when I can follow the title into vacation time.

I agree with the purpose of Gulliver, it is an old purpose, i.e. before news on the web was practical, lot’s of volume publishers of tomorrow’s garbage sought narrower (and smaller) fonts for purely financial reasons. But today, with trees not used much for paper, (volume publishers of daily publications normally use recycled pulp of some kind), the current frontier of typographic activism is elimination of printing day-after-use garbage altogether. Or at least, that’s what I think.

On another trail, there is a problem with thinking that “your fonts” will only be used for environmentally friendly purposes if they are at all suited to print use. But Nick says: “Is it really responsible to hype the newest biggest Airbus as being environmentally friendly?” If you don’t then you’re standing at the corner of No-Travel and Don’t Move. I don’t travel much because my carbon footprint can’t come with me, so it is pure burning man to go away without a dire need. However, I know lots and lots of, people will be doing so regardless of my private concerns... so why not root for a more efficient aeroplane?

And, I see no difference between relative and absolute morality, they are both 8 letters, and are usually about the same width.

Cheers!

I’ve been wondering how to apply the cradle to cradle concept to typedesign for some time now. Any thoughts on this?

Artur

I think trying to adapt the enormously broad concept of social responsibility to the rather narrow field of type design may not be the best use of our time. The use the fonts are put to (or who buys them) is usually way out of the hands of the designer. I mean one can hardly place your fonts off limits to, say, republican presidential candidates. In other words, aside from designing custom fonts for big oil or pharmaceutical companies it’s hard for me to think of a way that a type designer can be socially irresponsible, professionally. And since the wider idea of socially responsibility in graphic design has already been covered in another thread...

I say buy compact fluorescent lightbulbs, use public transportation and vote. Donate some of your earnings to causes you believe in. Carry around a reusable tote bag. Give an old lady or a pregnant woman your seat on the bus. Don’t buy gold or diamonds. Avoid fast food restaurants and chain stores - try to eat locally produced, organic food. Don’t eat chilean sea bass or other threatened fish. Keep after your elected officials, urge them to vote responsibly. Shut off the water while you brush your teeth. Try to avoid products made in countries that don’t have good employment or environmental practices (such as China). Take to the streets to support causes that are important to you. Don’t force your daughter to undergo female circumcision. The list goes on.

“Do we as typedesigners or typographers have an impact?”

You as a human have an impact. As a type designer, I dunno...be sure to use recycled paper note pads for your sketches and don’t make fonts for the terrorists. But, really, I’m struggling to come up with any type-centric issues regarding social resposibility.

the current frontier of typographic activism

What are the maths of paper vs. pixels?
With the rollover rate of hardware upgrades, and the energy costs of server farms, not to mention all the digital pages that get printed out anyway, I suspect that digital has a larger footprint than print.

Do flat-panel LCD screens use more power than CRT monitors?
Why isn’t “standby mode” illegal?

why not root for a more efficient aeroplane?

I would if there were a cap on emissions.
But reducing the rate of per-mile pollution is being used to greenwash an increase in overall travel miles, and overall pollution.

The current Toyota TV ads for their “green” cars make me sick, showing a guy driving and “making the planet safer for his children”. Take transit dude, or get on a push-bike.

The type industry has already had an impact: fonts are now ethereal digital phantoms; they take no resources to propagate, sell, store or use. They can be used purely in digital output media, they can be recycled (look at the lifespan of digital type compared to other software), and they create no waste when they are deleted. The ultimate green product! ;)

USING type (i.e. typography) can take advantage of waste-free or socially responsible methods, but it’s hardly the province of typographers to insist on socially conscionable media, methods or materials when the publisher, writer, soda-pop company or TV conglomerate calls all the shots.

In other words there isn’t really a meaningful link between social activism and type design. My cooking skills, my spending habits, my recycling strategy, My political affiliation, can all carry on without influence on, or from, my work as a type designer.

To patty and aluminum: I completely see your point and I somehow agree, but... You say, that as an individual I have an impact. And you say, that this has nothing to do with our trade. But what I ask myself is, why is it then, that these questions about social and environmental responsibility etc. so often pop up in discussions with people involved in type- or graphic-design?
To me it looks like there are two things relevant here. The first is, that we work with mass-media on a daily base. We know exactly how powerfull these information channels are and we spend a lot of time in making them accessible for people to get a certain information. We have kinda control how this thing is going to look like, but we rarely have control over the content. This can – in some cases – lead to frustration.
The second thing is, that our trade has certain, lets say “artistic” aspects. Artists tend to be critical and idealistic.

If we look back in time many typographers or graphic-designers have become autors themselves. They know the channels, they have contacts to publishers and printers and they know how to make printed stuff – to me it’s only logical, that sooner or later some of them start to write.

Considering these things I could imagine, that there IS something to discuss about this topic in relation to our trade.

To the discussion of the green cars... I agree with David – as long as we can not assume, that everybody acts responsible and instead of the car takes his bike, we must assume, that they use the car. So if this car runs with a very low petrol usage compared to the average, this might be a big success... And in that relation it actually might be a green car. Allthough, Nick – these ads make me sick as well... :-)

Good Night and thank you guys!

>Good Night and thank you guys!

Be sure to turn out the lights, as Thatcher once said.

Oh – to Arthur... I just got a grip on cradle to cradle, but did not dive into it deeply yet. But this might be interesting – thanks.

“I suspect that digital has a larger footprint than print.”
Then I guess you’re just fine with your paper world. Do any daily papers in Canada come with a calculator built in?

“The current Toyota TV ads for their “green” cars make me sick”
You like Momma Bear, Papa Bear and Baby Bear Hummer ads better? Join the fiction of these ads: imagine that after the guy’s dropped the kids at school, he picks up a carload of evironmental activistas, takes them to a remote spot where the bus don’t go, and lets them beat up on illegal whalers.

Cheers!

…he picks up a carload of evironmental activistas, takes them to a remote spot where the bus don’t go, and lets them beat up on illegal whalers.

In my imagination he leaves them there, they starve to death in the woods, and I go most of a summer without an infestation of Greenpeace volunteers begging me for money every time I walk the dogs.

Here is somebody selling a “green” font:

http://printgreener.com/product.html#font

They make it sound like they invented “condensed”.

“why is it then, that these questions about social and environmental responsibility etc. so often pop up in discussions with people involved in type- or graphic-design?”

Guilt.

The world of graphic design, for the most part, is an industry based on pure consumerism. While one could argue that there are all sorts of non-consumerist areas of graphic design, without consumerism, we just wouldn’t be that large of an industry.

And, of course typographers depend a lot of graphic designers, so there’s that ecosystem.

To get back to the guilt issue, I think the issue is that we talk a lot about it because we are indirectly helping destroy the planet by doing what we do...help sell crap.

I think there are two mindsets that ’commercial artists’ can have, neither being any better/worse in my opinion:

1) We are what we are. We help companies make money by providing better designed products, services, and advertising. The specific product/service is irrelevant, our only job is to help the customer meet their goals.

2) We are a major decision maker on what succeeds and fails in the market place. We as designers should make a conscious analysis of every client and product we work with and establish if it’s socially responsible for us to work with that client and/or/product.

Marketers have the most guilt. Designers next in th