I've now read my way through all the pages on this thread. Oh poor Trystan, I think it comes under the heading of 'woe unto he who tries to please everyone'!
The interesting thing is that to see what everyone else said I used the 'print' option to be able to read straight down without the breaks, and then pressing the 'back' button to come back I found the thread was quite easy to read
Like most, I get set in my ways, and yes the impact of the new design was a shock and I can't say I liked it at first sight, but I'm getting used to it already.
The variation in fonts seem to have bothered a fair few people. Once you get into reading the posts I think the fonts in the body text are fine (I'm talking from the accessability aspect, not the size, you've covered how to increase/decrease in detail). The font used for some of the headers has been remarked on, and I can see why when I look at the headers at the top of this page reading 'Hi Maggie 1895 Unread Replies Logout' etc. I work on screen all day and have a prescription for screen glasses that allow me to move comfortably between everything from pictures to html language, yet I find real difficulty reading those headers because they are so narrow and crammed together.
But that's a very minor point, but we all have a tendency to seize on one small niggle when feeling insecure. Bit like seeing an old friend with a new haircut and a facelift, and not liking it because it 'doesn't look like her'? All these small details may be future quick fixes if Trystan is in the mood to do any more tweaking later and not lying down somewhere in a darkened room through 2013? (and who could blame him)
What I can see is a huge piece of work to implement all this, and I agree with some of the other comments - RC is a brilliant site with so much help and support available for all of us, and all free. If this, including adverts interspersed across threads, is the way it needs to go to stay available, then thanks very much for all the hard work.
Us Luddites get attached to our old looms, but underneath it all, we're willing to try them there new fangled machines, honest.
ps - I think we're on Page 41, but then I was on the mulled wine earlier...