As a side-note, I’m 39, have strong prescription glasses, and run my 24″ cinema display at 1920 x 1200. I was actually able to read the 11px text just fine, but I bumped it up to make it slightly easier for others.

There’s always a balancing act between usability and aesthetics. I think blogs in particular are generally biased on the side of the individual blogger, as most bloggers design their site as much for themselves as they do for others.

Thanks for the input. :)

I am sorry if the web standards body takes exception with your view:

http://www.w3.org/QA/Tips/font-size

“As a base font size for a document, 1em (or 100%) is equivalent to setting the font size to the user’s preference. Use this as a basis for your font sizes, and avoid setting a smaller base font size.”

I am only 32 years old, and my screen resolution is not that bloody high, but if you’re talking 12 pixels I need a strong, monospace font with complete contrast (black or white or white on black) . . . I generally prefer at least 15 pixels to work with. This helps me avoid squinting or hunching over at my screen.

Fortunately, it is easy enough to crank the font size on a web page up these days, and the NoSquint plugin will remember font sizes for different web sites for me. Unfortunately most web sites, or at least blogs, fetishize tiny type, and often when I increase the font size I see interesting failures in a web site designed for pixel-perfect-looks-fabulous-on-my-MacBook-Pro without taking into account the nature of the world wide web, where people will view your web site in a few different browsers with many differences in stuff like screen resolution and how far they site from their screen, and their feelings about back posture.

Sincerely,
-daniel

*looks*

Oh yeah, 11 pixels. That’ll be legible on a VGA screen. ;)

Cheers,
-danny

PS No biggie I just use the NoSquint plugin but really absolute font sizing is a web design trainwreck that is widely abused.