One designer wrote: "Delete it. Burn the hard drive. It's not a font. It's a mirror."

And then, beneath it, in a smaller size, as if the font itself was typing back, a new word appeared—one he had not written.

But the word "uninspired" was a hot needle behind his eyes. He clicked.

It wasn't in his primary inbox, nor his spam folder. It materialized in a forgotten sub-folder labeled "Archives 2012." The sender was a string of alphanumeric gibberish: x9T3_void@null.net . The subject line: