Font Licensing
I’ve written about web font embedding before, and I think I’ll write about it again as today seems to be the time to discuss font licensing. I think I’ll throw my two cents into the matter. Font embedding through CSS and the @font-face at rule is only the first step to getting proper typography on the web. The second step is dealing with the archaic font licensing foundries are dishing out to people who pay their ridiculous prices for type. They need to change their font licensing and work with people actually using their products to develop something more attuned to modern usages of type or die a slow and horrible death.
People need to get it out of their heads that the only place to get quality type is from font foundries. That is complete bullshit. This weblog utilizes Delicious, a FREE typeface by Jos Buivenga which is unique and infinitely more well-designed than these typefaces provided by font foundries. Yes, generally free type is vastly inferior to type carefully designed by master typographers, but it’s not always the case. Quality free type is out there for people who want it. Once that concept is understood by font foundries and their allies then they will understand the situation they’re in.
I agree completely with Mr. Pilgrim’s views of the problem with one notable and very important exception. I’m willing to give the font foundries a chance, but if they don’t work with their customers and the people wanting to implement web embedding then I agree that the font foundries can go fuck themselves. All font foundries need to abide by these rules:
- When a user purchases a font he/she can put the font on all of the computers he/she owns or at least has adminstrator rights to as long as the font can only be used by the purchaser or people working for the purchaser.
- Fonts shouldn’t have to be repurchased to receive a font in additional formats.
- Typefaces purchased can be used on any material in which the third party viewing the material doesn’t have direct access to the font itself.
- The font can be embedded in any PDF or similar document format in a subsetted manner.
- Web fonts should be created abiding by rule #4 in a standardized format agreed upon by the foundries and the W3C by the user with mandatory DRM limiting the domains the typeface can be used on specified by the user. This can be done as many times as the user wants without additional necessary purchase as outlined in rule #2 as long as the end result abides by rule #3.
If you as a font foundry or an individual type designer do not offer licenses that follow those rules then you can go fuck yourself. Discussion is over with, and even getting to the point to where agreeing on a suitable way to embed purchased fonts on the web cannot be established. Proponents for the foundries like to state that fonts are software, not images. That is certainly true. Some foundries dislike users reusing their fonts on different projects. You buy a font for a particular usage, and once that usage is up you are required by their license to purchase an additional font. That would be like Adobe’s forcing their users to purchase an additional copy of Photoshop each time a task is completed. Let’s face it; a single type family can cost as much as Photoshop. What would you rather pay for? A license for Photoshop or a license for just part of the Helvetica type family?
This past October there was a meeting of the minds about font licensing, specifically whether the EOT format Microsoft developed should be made a standard and implemented by other browser developers. The meeting was akin to the Council of Elrond in Lord of the Rings. They sat down to discuss the One Ring’s fate. The meeting repetitively got out of Elrond’s hands where the numerous people attending the meeting began open arguments about what should happen to the One Ring. The same thing happened here except at the end of the Council of Elrond they did come to a conclusion, one that benefited all. A inconceivable “compromise” was established at the end of this meeting.
Truth be told Microsoft’s representatives in the meeting seemed to be the most level headed of the bunch. EOT is disliked by the other browser vendors, specifically Opera, simply because it’s invented by Microsoft. They believe that implementing EOT would give Microsoft an advantage. By that same logic the “compromise” that was reached that would add a table for domain locking to TrueType fonts would give Apple an advantage. Apple invented TrueType. It’s bullshit. It doesn’t matter who invented the format as long as it’s freely available without need to pay royalties.
Disregarding Embedded OpenType just because it was invented by Microsoft is stupid, but there are additional reasons not to support it:
- EOT is under DMCA. TrueType and OpenType aren’t.
- The font data within the EOT format is obfuscated.
- EOT is compressed using Microtype, a compression method not widely supported.
To support EOT a browser would first have to support Microtype and a method for unobfuscating the font and checking to see if the domain the font is limited to is the domain the font is being used on. That’s a terrible lot to process just to display a single font.
The “compromise” was that an additional “Web Table” for domain locking would be added to TrueType and OpenType fonts that cannot be ignored. Mark Pilgrim believes the table is bullshit, and needs to be supported in every program which uses fonts. I would certainly agree with him if they don’t create a separate format for font embedding and instead expect every piece of software to check the new table. It appears as if the “compromise” proposes a separate format for embedding. That’s perfectly fine by me, and if the font foundries and designers can get on board and adjust their licenses to fit within acceptable bounds (such as the rules I established earlier) then things’ll be great except two things:
I’M NOT PAYING FOR WEB FONTS THAT I’VE ALREADY PURCHASED IN ANOTHER FORMAT AND FOR EACH DOMAIN I USE THEM ON EITHER.
The solution in reality is to allow people to take TrueType or OpenType fonts they own and convert them to the embedded format themselves like how users can do today with EOT. The agreed upon embedding type format needs to have a license itself limiting its use to only web documents so that douchébags like the people implementing EOT in Linux can’t legally do the same with the new format.
Font foundries need to get their acts together and solve this problem before sensible people decide that it really is time to tell them to go fuck themselves.