Time has come to make some changes. I have created a new website: comdesres.com and that will be my main site from now. So if you are reading this at some future date, you probably want to head over there. I am not abandoning this site completely, just dedicating it to content in Finnish language. From now on, all English content will be on the new site.
There were several reasons why I wanted to make the change. First, and foremost, I have changed. I am not the same person who launched typo.fi. My interests have shifted towards a wider perspective on visual communication, slightly away from typography. Of course, typography remains an important part of visual communication, but it is not at the centre of my attention today.
Second, because of these changes in me, this site builds the wrong kind of image – brand, if you will – about me. When I set up this site a long time ago, it reflected me fairly well. It communicated my interest in typography and related matters well. But this page alone has become actually rather misleading. In general, I find it sometimes frustrating how many people still think I only do typography. Therefore, a moderate re-branding is in order.
Third, I have always been discontent with the bilingual nature of this site. At some point I tried doing two different language version of it, but then I reverted to this current bilingual compromise. Having two completely different sites makes a lot of sense from the language perspective. These languages will now be also properly reflected in the domain names: The suffix .fi here will signal Finnish content, while .com will contain only English.
Fourth, I’ve always been unhappy about the fact that most of the variants of the domain name ”typo” have already been reserved. For example, typo.com has been empty but on sale for many years. Unfortunately it is way too expensive to purchase. (I think it has some temporary content now finally, but apparently it is still on sale for about 300,000 USD.) Some of them also belong to friends. Like typo.cz who belongs to the Czech typography magazine. That similarity is kind of fun, but it also means differentiating oneself with just ”typo” doesn’t work.
So now I am much happier when I have my own distinct domain name. The new domain is slightly longer, but nicely embraces who I am today: Not just typography but communication, design, and research.
That’s about it. This will be my last blog posting here. This site will of course have content about history and typography in Finnish, but all future blog posts and English articles will be at comdesres.com. So, international friends, I’ll see you there!