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Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

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Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#111

Post by cwkoss »

mattkevan wrote: post #55
skilled wrote: post #14

I'm guilty of having searched GitHub's repositories for fonts I like. Using them for personal projects and wouldn't mind paying for a license if I end up loving it. Though, it begs the question: who and how will find out that you simply borrowed the font?

They can and do find out. I used to work for a company that got hit up by Monotype for a six figure fine to pay for using one of their fonts. The previous head of design hadn’t bothered to sort tricky things like paying for fonts, mainly, I think, because he knew senior management wouldn’t spring for it. We switched them out for free alternatives and negotiated down the fee, but they still had to part with a good amo…

Companies which depend on IP trolling for their primary revenue always end up being extortionists who drain society without producing further value.

Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#112

Post by jzunit »

Brendinooo wrote: post #102
jzunit wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The profit margins we are eating into is exactly ZERO. Why? because if most of the time i need to actually pay for it, i'll just use the cheaper alternative: Google Fonts. There will be times when I need to use this font and make something that will go live. That's the time to buy a font. If font making is not profitable, then don't make fonts.

This attitude is absolutely bonkers. Someone is making a product and telling you what you can and cannot do with it, and then you decide that none of that applies to you, because...I don't know, you're entitled to use it if you happen to see it? "There will be times when I need to use this font and make something that will go live. That's the time to buy a font." - that depends on the license that the font foundry gr…

Most of the people who are taking your fonts are also making a product. We understand the need to make a living and the difficulty of making a product. I hope you get paid for what you do but you don't get to decide the market size for your product when it is a digital good. The market does.

There is a market for paid specialty fonts used on a website. People should pay for that. However, there is not much of a market for paid fonts used in Sketch when developers and designers are testing out different concepts they MIGHT use in production. You complaining that you are failing to monetizing off that non-existent market is completely bonkers for me.

The ground I stand on is reality. You're living in a fantasy land where musicians still get paid big dollars for records and where journalism is a lucrative career.

Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#113

Post by empath75 »

Brendinooo wrote: post #64
jzunit wrote: post #6

Been doing searches for "site:github.com .ttf" for years. This is a feature not a bug.

Yikes. You ever try making a font? Do you know how many hours it takes and what kind of profit margins you're eating into?

Most people that pirate stuff never would have bought it to begin with. If pirated stuff wasn’t available, they’d have just gone without or gone with a free alternative. I don’t expect it has much impact over all.

Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#114

Post by floatboth »

the_pwner224 wrote: post #110
pmoriarty wrote: post #82

I've always found it interesting how the term "piracy" has been mostly unquestioningly accepted by the media as the appropriate term to use for copying, which arguably doesn't steal anything (unlike what has traditionally been known as piracy before the digital age).

Sharing is an even better term than copying; spreading information like this actively creates value by exposing more people to these ideas and designs. Not that I don't think the foundries should get paid for their work - I don't have a fully formed opinion on this. But there is a definite upside to sharing information freely, and this is better than mere copying.

Just like all software, there's a lot of Free Software fonts and that's not incompatible with money.

For example, back in 2012, I supported three SIL OFL licensed fonts on Kickstarter:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/typesenses/font-design-... https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/impallari/fast-brush-sc... https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/marcelommp/folk-is-a-gr...

Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#115

Post by tatersolid »

cannonedhamster wrote: post #57
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Shh! Whisper this too loudly and people will start moving font-rendering behind DRM encryption modules.

Too late. They've already tried to do this.

In like 1988 as I recall. adobe Type 1 fonts were encrypted with a static key: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/PostScript_fonts#History

Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#116

Post by zrobotics »

snek wrote: post #18
Gracana wrote: post #5

What's the difference between putting webfonts on your public website vs putting them on your public github? This seems like a distinction that only lawyers would care about, but I'm not a web developer (and I don't know much about webfonts) so maybe there's something I'm missing.

Even better, what if I have it on github because github pages is my site host?

I don't host w/ github pages, but when I was looking I don't remember there being any restriction on the repo being private. Why does the repo need to be public?

Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#118

Post by roywiggins »

sp332 wrote: post #78
bryanrasmussen wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the repo is the source for the website then the license is de facto forbidding people from open sourcing their websites if they pay for a font for it. However the license does not explicitly limit the tools you can use to build the website, and the website is allowed by the license to have the font. The argument could be made by licensing the font for a website they have implicitly licensed it to be on github beca…

Realistically, I don't know if the font makers would bother suing someone for this reason. But I think it's more likely that they might ask GitHub to start removing unlicensed copies of their files.

Seems to be exactly what the DMCA was meant for.

Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#119

Post by Aeolun »

nwellnhof wrote: post #75
gregmac wrote: post #40

If I use a commercial font as part of my website design, I am in fact publishing that font on my site and anyone can obtain a copy of it -- in fact, they automatically do merely by visiting my site! Does this mean all my visitors are "pirating"? Of course not. Github may make the font more accessible/searchable, but that doesn't change anything about the copyright status of the font. Me publishing something on Github…

> If I use a commercial font as part of my website design, I am in fact publishing that font on my site and anyone can obtain a copy of it -- in fact, they automatically do merely by visiting my site! It depends on the file format. Commercial web font providers typically don't offer TTF or OTF formats but only (subsetted) WOFF. You can't use WOFF fonts with most graphics design software (although conversion to TTF is…

Or not, since any business making money with those fonts will still buy a license.

Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)

#120

Post by gohbgl »

Brendinooo wrote: post #64
jzunit wrote: post #6

Been doing searches for "site:github.com .ttf" for years. This is a feature not a bug.

Yikes. You ever try making a font? Do you know how many hours it takes and what kind of profit margins you're eating into?

Find a better business model. I could care less about people not being able to extract enough money from their monopoly rights.
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