light grey? If 808080 is neutral mid grey, how can 4A525A (32% lightness) be anything but a dark grey? The contrast seems quite readable to me, and seems to pass guidelines: https://coolors.co/contrast-checker/ffffff-4a525a

Try the actual text color instead of fff (also in quotes, which take up most of the space)

The actual text color is either #fff or #ddd depending on if you’re talking about a blockquote. #fff gets full marks; #ddd gets a “good” rating.

no, it's #eee for the main text and #ddd for the quotes

And both are slightly above "minimum contrast", nothing good about it despite what the checker sites says

> it’s #eee

I’m going by reading the CSS.

> both are slightly above "minimum contrast"

That’s simply not true.

Try going by reading the actual page instead, or a web inspector can read CSS rules better than you, linkedlist overrides fff

I can only surmise you’re referring to Daring Fireball, not James’s blog. You might want to check your monitor’s color calibration (specifically its white point) or brightness setting. DF is and always has been white/light gray on dark gray. Specifically, it’s #fff (body text) or #ddd (blockquotes) on #4a525a.

Why do you need any calibration to see that this is an awful color scheme?

Even black on white can be awful with disastrous calibration... white on #4A525A is almost white on black. It looks good on any of my screens and I don't even have that good calibration.

there is nothing "almost" about it, #4A525A is ~35 on a 100 lightness scale away from black, "almost" would be 5% or something

It’s still within contrast accessibility guidelines. I find it much more pleasing on the eyes than full black on white, which causes a lot of eyestrain on an emissive display like a monitor.

Minimum accessibility requirement doesn't define high quality and full black on white isn't the only alternative, so no need to limit your comparison to it