[mstolpm]

I don't have a citation, but a personal anecdote: When I was in charge for a website, an elderly woman contacted us and asked, if we could change the black text to a dark grey. She mentioned that the contest was too high, resulting for her in seeing ghost images of the letters. I changed the text color from black to something like #eee or #ddd (at least a change barely noticeable) and she later contacted us to to thank us, so it must have had an effect on her. So it seems, for some people with limited eyesight, contrast can be too high as well.

However, I agree with the generell sentiment that in modern web design, contrast is often too low.

[Koffiepoeder]

I think you mean #111 or #222. The ghost letter thing is interesting to me. Was the background plain white or more of a broken white?