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Cleveland Cavaliers Owner Writes Open Letter To Fans -- In Comic Sans Font

Comic Sans MS, in all its glory.
Comic Sans MS, in all its glory.

As we noted earlier, Dan Gilbert, the majority owner of the Cleveland Cavaliers, wrote an open letter to his fans last night. His star player, LeBron James, had just announced his decision to defect to the Miami Heat, and he was upset.

Fair enough.

What we didn't mention: Gilbert wrote that note in Comic Sans MS.

On his show today, WNYC's Brian Lehrer spoke to Vincent Connare, the creator of that font:


He designed Comic Sans in 1994, as a Microsoft employee.

So, 16 years later, how did Connare learn that Gilbert used his font, which is regularly mocked and maligned?

On Twitter[, of course]. (It has been one of the hottest trending topics on the social network since the letter was posted.)

And how did he react?

"I laughed, as I think probably everybody else did," Connare said. "And I thought, yeah, good on him."

You can't write everything in Swiss typography. You can't write everything in serious typography. There's a whole other group of people in the world that like having fun, pick this font because it's not Times New Roman. They pick it 'cause its different.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

David Gura
Based in New York, David Gura is a correspondent on NPR's business desk. His stories are broadcast on NPR's newsmagazines, All Things Considered, Morning Edition and Weekend Edition, and he regularly guest hosts 1A, a co-production of NPR and WAMU.