Matt Cynamon's Profile

It isn’t just about using light-on-dark text in the main content area either. I also find that high contrasts between different areas of the page cause problems. An example is when the main content area uses dark-on-light and there is an inverted sidebar right next to it. It hurts my eyes, and if possible I make my browser window narrow enough to hide the inverted part of the page when I visit sites that have that kind of design.

Note that I am not criticising the aesthetics of inverted designs, just their readability. Several light-on-dark sites look fantastic for a few seconds or even a minute

When reversing colour out, eg white text on black, make sure you increase the leading, tracking and decrease your font-weight. This applies to all widths of Measure. White text on a black background is a higher contrast to the opposite, so the letterforms need to be wider apart, lighter in weight and have more space between the lines.

Reading experience along with halation (the tendency of white
characters or text to "glow" when presented on a black background)
may account for the beneficial influence of negative contrast.

Ogilvy on Advertising by David Ogilvy. If my memory serves me, Ogilvy discourraged the use of white text on a black back backgrounds except sparingly and as a highlighting tool.

As an interesting aside, in the late 1980's and early 1990's it was fashionable to use white text on a blue background. WordPerfect is one of many examples that comes to mind. I do not know if white on blue was a result of studies, though I know I preferred white on blue, even for a few years past its popularity.

I would have to say that most websites use white backgrounds. So when a visitor is browsing the web for a long period of time (visiting sites which have white backgrounds) and then suddenly visit a website with a black background, there is a visual problem; the visitors eyes don't focus fast enough for the change, etc. And as studies show, first impressions really are everything. And first impressions are made very quickly.

When I see white text on a black background I always worry if the page is going to print out correctly.

Beige, blue, burgundy and dark green are also good for businesses that want to give an impression of high quality, solidity and tradition. Keep main text content areas on a white or very light background.

Blue and yellow used together where you need to distinguish between the two colours to understand the content -- 1-2% of men have blue / yellow colour blindness

No matter how smart you think you are, there will always be this one question to answer: How do we make this better? Let others take a stab and build upon your movement.

while you might position yourself as the poster child of the movement, it is not about you, it is about what is happening.

The magic that Kiva is missing out on here is giving donors the power. You just might be amazed at how open-minded, helpful, and flexible donors will be when you put the reins in their hands.

the # of donors willing to pay >10% is very low- the curve tapers off very quickly once you cross 10-15% as admin costs.