I noted the article's dig at "lack of proper [i.e., curly] quotes and apostrophes" and wondered what the date was that the show switched to straight quotes (they used to be curly back in the '80s and maybe some of the '90s).
Also there seemed to be some curiosity in the article as to why Korinna would be picked given that there are more legible fonts. Well, there might not have been much choice at the time Korinna was picked. According to an August 23, 2014 blog post by Tom Thomas, which I will reproduce below for posterity because I can't find a way to link to it and am not able to access it except through a Google cache which will probably be wiped sooner or later, the font was likely one of the few available for the Chyron that would have been able to be made big enough to read on a 13" clue screen at a distance across a soundstage. I also recall it being one of the most popular fonts on TV during the '80s, being used for sitcoms, morning shows, and loads of game shows.
I can understand keeping Korinna around on the clue screens to this day, despite the plethora of more readable choices available--tradition, you don't fix what ain't broken, etc. What I can't understand is why the show uses the font in print on the game boards Alex uses at his lectern, and on the prompt cards used by the Clue Crew when recording video clues.
And for those interested in the original Corinna...AUGUST 23, 2014 I'LL TAKE SPORTS FOR $200, ALEX
(Lights flash)
Tom: “What is Korinna?”
Alex: “That is correct!”
Early in 1984, Betsy Overly and I were planning the graphics for Pittsburgh Pirates cablecasts. We needed a fresh look and a new font style.
Chyron, the company that manufactured the character generator, provided a “font library” for their machine on 8-inch floppy disks. A few dozen styles were available. Some were offered in only one size, but there were several that came in five different sizes, providing flexibility.
One of those, called Korinna Bold, caught our eye. It was a fresh, relatively new font; the modern version had been introduced only ten years before. It had some flair, with the distinctive shapes of the P and the N and especially the U, yet it was sufficiently bold for sports television. So we chose it to build the full screens and lower thirds that we’d need for baseball. Our new look premiered on a road game on April 6.
Unfortunately, by the time the team returned to Pittsburgh, the network was out of business, and our graphics package was never seen again. More details are here.
That same year, however, a long-running game show was being updated with a new host and a new look for syndication. And the producers made the same Chyron choice that Betsy and I had made.
Thirty years ago next month, Alex Trebek introduced Jeopardy! with the clues given in Korinna. The font’s still there three decades later. You can’t keep a good idea down.
Here are some other notes.
• Korinna was also used for the intertitles and closing credits on the 1993-2004 comedy Frasier.
• Ken Jennings claims that when he had his winning run 10 years ago, the name of the show was still pronounced “jee-OP-ur-dee.”
• And why is it called Jeopardy anyway? Alex could say, “I told you that on the very first program, when I explained how the game is played. Weren’t you listening? Do I have to repeat the rules every 30 years?”
