The typeface was designed to embrace the limitations of the cathode ray tube technology used by early data display screens and phototypesetting equipment, and thus only contains horizontal and vertical strokes.

[2] Crouwel largely agreed with the criticism and noted that it was mostly an exercise in theory, stating in 2009: "The New Alphabet was over-the-top and never meant to be really used.

"[3] New Alphabet was one of 23 digital typefaces acquired by the Museum of Modern Art in January 2011 for its Architecture and Design Collection.

The original concept wasn't limited to three weights, but was intended as a parametric system, giving the possibly to make many different shapes by changing the parameters in the machine.

In 2015, Joshua Koomen developed, based on the original instructions, a digital[4] version of New Alphabet in the form of a web-app.