: Why do we still use points as a measurement of type size? I'm in the UK, which uses metric units for pretty much everything now except road distances and beer (obviously best kept apart).

@Hamm6457569

The most basic reason points are still around is there's nothing metric that can usefully replace them. Note that word, "usefully." There are a couple of reasons why: (1) as Lauren points out (pun hard to avoid... or resist), 6-12-72 has many more even divisors than decimal, so it's easier to work with, just as 60 is much more practical for angles and time than any kind of decimal equivalent. But (2) in very practical terms, 1/72nd of an inch is a much smaller increment than 1 mm. A 1mm difference in type size is much greater, visually, than a 1 point difference. 10 point type and 11 point type are markedly different sizes, but 6 mm and 7 mm are enormously different. The eye sees incredibly fine differences in typography. One word out of alignment by as little as 1/10th of a point is visible even to the untrained eye, and leaps out at a designer like DayGlo socks at a funeral. So if we tried to shoehorn our type sizes into a decimal strait-jacket, we'd be working with unwieldy fractions all the time.

The no-longer-relevant-in-the-digital-age measurements, like ciceros and agates, are endangered species, hanging on only in protected corners of InDesign and Quark, no longer seen in the wild. Points, like cockroaches, are hardy survivors that will be here long after mankind has rendered himself obsolete.

Like most systems of measurement, points are fundamentally arbitrary, but they have stuck around for centuries because they are so immensely practical. The relatively coarse metric system just isn't a good substitute. For much the same reason, you're not likely to see grams replace carats in the gem industry, either. And for a slightly different reason, the good old British pint will be with us for a long time to come.

Vote Up Vote Down

@Reiling762

Every standard dimension has its unit of measurement

Type has been around since Gutenberg and it's always been set in points. Every dimension has it's own unit of measurement. Let's say we have metres. Why would anyone use AUs in space measurements? Why not use kilometres instead? The same goes to type. Why use mm if points are units of type size.

If you'd read The elements of typographic style you'd see that particular point sizes related to type have their own names as well (like nonpareil: 6pt, minion: 7pt, brevier, bourgeois etc...). It's been standard for hundreds of years, why invent something unconventional and confuse the world.

Vote Up Vote Down

@Speyer780

I can't cite anything in particular, but from my U.S. perspective, the 6-12-72 base is very flexible (that is, it's easy to divide and get round numbers), and since we've been measuring and defining type this way for 150+ years, the industry is unlikely to make a wholesale change on its own. Inertia is pretty powerful.

To change points to mm, you'd wind up getting all sorts of repeating decimals, or we'd have to redefine absolutely everything, which might mean a lot of very tiny type retooling. And re-purchasing.

I have to say I've never even heard of type, itself, being measured in anything else (other than pixels, which is not for print).

Vote Up Vote Down