This is the HN equivalent of avocado-toast bashing. Let’s not do that.
As someone who used dark themes with CRTs whenever possible in the ‘90s, my theory is simply that those studies you mention were academic horseshit - CRTs with bright backgrounds were eye-killers. Well, they were eye-killers in general, but more when set with bright backgrounds.
Unfortunately, colorbleed in small-size text made it a bit more difficult to read text on dark backgrounds, but that could be somewhat compensated with larger fonts if you had a big enough display. So basically you could choose two different ways to kill yourself, but one of them gave you a chance if you were rich enough (and lucky enough - most programs on Windows never allowed you to change their white background). Man, CRT was so shit.
LCDs are much better in general, and occasionally worse (a lot of games make my eyes cry, with their aggressively shiny palettes). I still prefer dark out of habit in most cases, but it really depends on the monitor (and its calibration) and the surroundings. Saying one mode or the other is superior in all circumstances is silly, imho. And certainly wouldn’t bash millennials, or question their geek-manliness, for choosing this or that mode.
I’ve always liked to work at night or early morning or northern European winter afternoons and since 2002 it’s been obvious to me that a dark but not black background with a medium contrast text is optimal for day and night, especially the Zenburn theme. Please don’t come to my house at night and switch to a white theme because of “science”...
Of course everyone can use whatever they want. Arguments of taste are irresistible, that's all. (Did I mention I like proportional fonts?)
The bashing is mostly the other way around though. I regularly get shit from people because I prefer white backgrounds. It's also some kind of meme — just the other day I saw a popular tweet that read "People who use light background IDEs are serial killers." As an edge case GenX-millennial who buys expensive avocados and lets them rot, it's pretty much my glass house for rock-throwing practice anyway...
I don’t think you really want me to break down a very clear similitude in smaller chunks for your comprehension, considering you follow with a gratuitous and unsubstantiated ad-hominem and incendiary language. Have a good day, sir.
As someone who used dark themes with CRTs whenever possible in the ‘90s, my theory is simply that those studies you mention were academic horseshit - CRTs with bright backgrounds were eye-killers. Well, they were eye-killers in general, but more when set with bright backgrounds.
Unfortunately, colorbleed in small-size text made it a bit more difficult to read text on dark backgrounds, but that could be somewhat compensated with larger fonts if you had a big enough display. So basically you could choose two different ways to kill yourself, but one of them gave you a chance if you were rich enough (and lucky enough - most programs on Windows never allowed you to change their white background). Man, CRT was so shit.
LCDs are much better in general, and occasionally worse (a lot of games make my eyes cry, with their aggressively shiny palettes). I still prefer dark out of habit in most cases, but it really depends on the monitor (and its calibration) and the surroundings. Saying one mode or the other is superior in all circumstances is silly, imho. And certainly wouldn’t bash millennials, or question their geek-manliness, for choosing this or that mode.