JPEG compression is an 24-bit "lossy" compression algorithm. The image is
cut up into quarters and tested for color change. Each quater is further
divided up until the comressor knows which parts of the image are odd. Then the
odd pixels are thrown out. The Unfortunately, the tossed pixels are ussually
the "line information" I was talking about in the GIF section of this presentation.
So, unlike GIF, JPEGs are NOT for text and line drawing sorts of things.
You don't believe me? Here are a few examples copressed with a little
compression, some compression and a lot of comression.
51 K
18 K
Notice that there is a lot of compression, yet the
background looks pretty good!