Being a graphics geek is sometimes a lonely road. While life in Austin does afford me the advantage of having access to a large media community full of tech savy peers, it’s still not hard to find myself in a room full of people that will leave me scratching for some common ground on which to establish some basis for idle chit-chat.

Conversely, sports fans seem to have it all too easy. Games occur all the time. And no matter what team you tend to favor, or for that matter – what sport you tend to favor, there is always some pathway to conversation regarding who won what, where – and how they came to emerge triumphant. Plenty of room for criticism, talking smack, or philosophizing on what the next big contest will bring.

Media heads are often a bit thinner in a crowd. It’s seldom that you’ll see two geek-types going face-to face over the virtues of 3d Studio Max vs. Maya, or whether the next release of Expression Design is going to blow the pants off of Photoshop. (Ain’t gonna happen…Although, I have seen that Flash vs. HTML5 thing get a little tense a time or two.) For people that can name more than a dozen font types by sight, unless you are lucky enough to cross paths with someone else in the crowd with a similar skill set, anything you’re likely to say related to these subjects is likely to get you a puzzled frown, and a quickly rotating view toward the backside of the object of your was-emerging discussion as they attempt to fade into the crowd and put some distance between themselves and your nerdy personage.

Thankfully, folks of our slant have found some kindred spirits in the hearts and minds of a pair of the comedic producers at College Humor.com, having produced a viral piece that they lovingly titled, “Font Conference”. This vid was created by Sam Reich (who plays the role of “Broadway”) and Sam Gurewitch (appearing as the punch-line dropping “Wingdings”), and expands on the concept of personification of the default Windows font set with the greatest of abandon, and I might ad – effectiveness. All I can say is – Dang!… I wish I had thought of this.

Even if your interest in visual communication is limited to – dare I say, clip art in Word, or perhaps the more conservative province of background colors in Excel (and they call ~me~ a geek…) This is a darn funny clip, and sure to bring a smile to most everybody – with the exception of the entirely computer illiterate.  And – should you happen to fall into the latter category, rest assured that the upcoming Synchronized Mud-Surfing championship airing on ESPN3 this weekend will provide more than enough water-cooler fodder next week to keep your social circle in tact.

Hope you enjoy.  -D