Yeah, the brown is really grimey and not the easiest to read under certain lighting conditions.
Various lighting conditions often seems to be ignored, or probably just not understood enough, by too many people designing websites. Not only do different machines display differently but they will be utilized in lots of different lighting environments. That's especially true with all of the high tech phones and laptops used nowadays. What looks nice and clear on one machine and in one room may be extremely difficult to view in another. Brown against black or grey is not a safe choice unless one can have better control over the actual viewing environment.
Yellow would be easier but I would avoid a bright out and out yellow as the contrast may be too high and blur out to some eyes. Would have to try out some of the others but a slightly more muted yellow, like maybe a gold or something, might work much better.
But yeah, I'm fully with you on all of that.
