Where did the pixels go? Not so long ago, you couldn’t look at type on a computer without seeing the ghost of the screen’s pixel grid behind it. But as screen resolutions have improved (thank you, Moore’s Law), pixels have become at once far more plentiful and far less visible. Indeed, the pixel has all but disappeared. Look hard at what you’re reading: Can you see one?

Jason Kottke points to a fascinating little essay on the death of the pixel by type designer Jonathan Hoefler. Digital designers long struggled with the tension between graceful letterforms and the clumsy, pointillist grid on which they had to be rendered. But, as Hoefler points out, the struggle was nothing new. Hundreds of years ago, words were routinely embroidered on fabric, requiring the adaptation of type to a rough pixel grid. “Renaissance ‘lace books’ have much to offer the modern digital designer,” writes Hoefler, “who also faces the challenge of portraying clear and replicable images in a constrained environment.”

But, Hoefler goes on, that age-old challenge is going away: “Pixels were the stuff of my first computer, which strained to show 137 of them in a square inch; my latest cellphone manages 32,562 in this same space, and has 65,000 colors to choose from, not eight. Its smooth anti-aliased type helps conceal the underlying matrix of pixels, which are nearly as invisible as the grains of silver halide on a piece of film.” The pixel’s existence is “moribund,” and it’s only going to become more so: “Crisp cellphone screens aren’t the end of the story. There are already sharper displays on handheld remote controls and consumer-grade cameras, and monitors supporting the tremendous WQUXGA resolution of 3840×2400 are making their way from medical labs to living rooms.”

So what’s left for the once-mighty pixel? “It’s likely that the pixel’s final and most enduring role will be a shabby one, serving as an out-of-touch visual cliché to connote ‘the digital age.'”

That’s kind of touching. Honestly, I hardly even noticed that pixels had disappeared until I read Hoefler’s essay. And now I find myself a wee bit nostalgic for the little sons of bitches.