What I love about Helvetica is how well Gary Hustwit brings out the personalities of the designers. The disagreements between the post-modernists and the modernists remind me of the two great Array language debates: Index origin and the APL characterset.
Ah yes, the perpetual quad-IO debate…
Here’s a gem of a cartoon about the very subject, which cracked me up:
http://xkcd.com/163/ [hover over the panel for extra comments]
It’s wonderful that you made that connection between the Helvetica movie and classic APL debates! As it happens, I just saw the movie for the first time less than a month ago (and really loved it). I wonder if there is much overlap between array programmers and type junkies? By coincidence, there’s a strong APL programmer down the hall from me who used to set type…coincidence, probably, but I can see a connection within the love of precision and elegance.
There you go Don. I’ve used my super powers to put your image into your comment.
Thanks! That’s a good one.