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There are several ways to ensure you can use your preferred fonts on the Web.

First of all, you can use images with headers without hurting SEO. The text is either shoved offscreen or covered with a graphic.

There are also some more complicated (to my mind) text replacement methods using Flash and other techniques.

Most current browsers support @fontface (a CSS method) but you have to upload multiple font versions for the different browsers. The font files can be big (bad for downloading) and when I’ve tested @fontface on pages, the text looked funny. There may also be a problem with font licensing; your desired font might be restricted from being stored on a server.

For body text, here’s a list of fonts you can expect computer users to have.

If you’re not building the pages yourself, just tell your Web production person what you want and let them take care of it.

POD is a process: Print On Demand. Any printshop running a digital press — such as a DocuTech, an Indigo, an iGen, a Nuvera — can provide POD services. They print only the quantity you need. There’s no minimum of 500 or 1,000 copies. Kinko’s and AlphaGraphics are POD shops, just as Lightning Source is. By the way, Lightning Source isn’t a publisher and doesn’t call itself one.

The companies that facilitate on-demand book printing and delivery, like iUniverse and AuthorHouse, aren’t PODs — they’re POD publishers, also called subsidy publishers. (And don’t let these companies fool you — you’re not the publisher unless you own the ISBN.) POD describes the process they use.

Don’t take my word for it:

• http://www.unionwriters.org/posts/index.php?p=215
• http://www.graphic-design.com/news/2007/print_on_demand.html
• http://www.sfwa.org/beware/printondemand.html
• http://fictionwriting.about.com/od/publishingterms/g/pod.htm

September was the tenth-year anniversary of Williams Writing, Editing & Design. Hurray!

Happy new year!

To celebrate I’ve begun a business blog. Once or twice a month I’ll post something business-related — projects completed, kudos for my clients, industry news.

It joins my personal blog, which I began at the summer solstice.