What’s in a font? This week, we look at the cyber storm unleashed by Ikea’s decision to change the typeface of its logo, Collins’ stamp of approval for Twitter and tweet, and social networking sites’ growing share of web advertising.

Backlash to Ikea’s new look

Ikea’s new look has got some fans hopping mad. Last month, the Swedish furniture and furnishings chain decided to change its signature typeface, a customised version of Futura, to Verdana. Ikea used the new font in its 2010 catalogue but the decision “provoked an instantaneous global backlash, the kind that can only happen on the Internet”.

Fans showed their disgust on online forums and Twitter, and on Aug 26, Romanian design consultant Marius Ursache launched an online petition to persuade Ikea to change its mind. Time.com reported that the same night, “Verdana was already a trending topic on Twitter, drawing more tweets than even Ted Kennedy.” 

Some may think this is a storm in a teacup, but designers say that the issue is about more than just a typeface – it goes to the heart of design. Verdana, a typeface invented by Microsoft, was designed for the Web and lacks elegance when used in large size, whether on billboards or in catalogues, they say.

Ikea spokeswoman Monika Gocic was quoted as saying that Ikea chose Verdana because the typeface, distributed free by Microsoft, is more efficient and cost-effective, in addition to being “a simple, modern-looking typeface".

Fans beg to differ. As Ursache said, “If a company like Ikea can make this mistake, you have to wonder who is going to lead when it comes to design."

Twitter makes it into Collins

It’s official, Twitter (the noun) is now in the dictionary, and so is tweet (the verb). They are among some 270 entries that editors at Britain's Collins English Dictionary added to the 30th anniversary edition, published on Sept 3.

Aside from giving the nod to terms associated with digital culture, the latest edition of the dictionary also embraces environmental concerns, as seen in the terms craggers (members of carbon reduction action groups), ecotarian (a person who only eats food that has been produced in an environmentally friendly manner) and carborexics (those obsessed with reducing their carbon footprint).

To qualify for inclusion in the respected lexicon, over the past two years, a word must have six quality citations in Collins' digital corpus, a computerised database that scans 2.5 billion words across various print and online resources.

Social networking sites grab one in five Web ads

The competition is heating up in digital advertising between social networking sites and established Internet companies such as Yahoo Inc and Time Warner Inc's AOL. ComScore’s Ad Metrix service showed that about one in five Internet display ads in the US is viewed on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.

According to the study, released last Tuesday, Facebook and MySpace shared 80% of ad displays, out of the 21.1% of total Internet display ads in July.

AT&T was ranked as the top display advertiser on social networking sites, with more than two billion ad impressions, which accounted for 30% of the company’s total number of display ads in June.

Experian Interactive, which delivered a heavy rotation of ads for educational degree programmes and credit scores, ranked second with nearly 1.3 billion impressions in the category.

"Because the top social media sites can deliver high reach and frequency against target segments at a low cost, it appears that some advertisers are eager to use social networking sites as a new advertising delivery vehicle," said Jeff Hackett, senior vice president of comScore.

Placing an ad on social networking sites costs significantly less than on a Web portal like Yahoo or AOL, said Jeff Lindsay, a Sanford Bernstein analyst.

The large amount of Web pages available on social networks translates into a massive volume of ads at bargain prices for advertisers, he added.