Helvetica Now Variable • Hacker News Board

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#101

Post by jstummbillig » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 7:51 PM UTC

todd3834 wrote: post #18

Am I crazy for expecting fonts to be free? There are so many good options that I can use without paying a license fee. I can't imagine liking the tiny differences in a font so much that I would get myself locked into a yearly licensing fee.

Well, no, it's realistic. I find myself going to Google Fonts more and more these days, even for serious brand work. This is mostly due to Google and a few other companies sponsoring the making of great open fonts.

However, the free market situation is pretty yikes. A few giants and a bunch of boutique foundries (check out https://klim.co.nz/) still make it work, but the open source monetisation problem that we find in software is a lot worse when it comes to fonts, because there is no sustainable product/service to sell with your free font.

Maybe the age of great font making is coming to a close. After what must be hundreds of thousands of great fonts (and so many people still just opting for Helvetica), maybe we got all we need.

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#102

Post by jressey » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 7:55 PM UTC

"Helvetica® Now Variable builds on the groundbreaking work of 2019’s Helvetica Now release."

I am so far out of touch that I cannot believe this is relevant to anyone outside of designers who build their career on constantly changing to the newest thing?

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#103

Post by otterley » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 7:58 PM UTC

todd3834 wrote: post #18

Am I crazy for expecting fonts to be free? There are so many good options that I can use without paying a license fee. I can't imagine liking the tiny differences in a font so much that I would get myself locked into a yearly licensing fee.

Should we reasonably expect the fruit of anyone's labor to be free? It's a designer's right to voluntarily give away their product, but that doesn't mean it's our right to use just anyone's work for free without their permission.

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#104

Post by da_chicken » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 8:01 PM UTC

stimpson_j_cat wrote: post #59

da_chicken wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unfortunately it is expensive, and you can't just buy it and use it, you have to renew the license annually. Not even that. If you want it for a web page you have to pay in blocks of page views. In my mind that moves it from "eh" to "LOL no". These are licensing terms for people who want the name.

That's a standard practice for a lot of webfont vendors isn't it? I know it was for Typekit/Adobe Fonts (which requires a Creative Cloud subscription).

I'm sure it is standard practice. That still doesn't make commercial web font licenses more reasonable for anything except advertising and marketing campaigns.

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#105

Post by vmception » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 8:02 PM UTC

flowerlad wrote: post #9

Fantastic font, now infinitely malleable! Unfortunately it is expensive, and you can't just buy it and use it, you have to renew the license annually. https://www.myfonts.com/fonts/mti/helvetica-now-variable?tab... And my use case isn't even covered: include in a web application that will be downloaded and installed by customers. My current choice is OpenSans https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Open+Sans

The secret ingredient is copyright infringement

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#106

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 8:10 PM UTC

alberth wrote: post #72

mikedc wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Users agree to a EULA which stipulates how they can and can't use the font. This contract provides the legal basis on which a foundry would pursue someone for suspected misuse. Here's Monotype's EULA for Helvetica Now[0], Section 9 specifically addresses copies and derivative works. From there, it becomes a legal matter. [0] https://www.fonts.com/font/monotype/helvetica-now/licenses#

But how can you differentiate a Helvetica created font file from a font file where I manually traced every Helvetica alphabet identically.

[deleted]

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#107

Post by xboxnolifes » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 8:14 PM UTC

jstx1 wrote: post #39

Do you genuinely notice differences between fonts? I have a general sense of monospaced vs proportional and serif vs sans-serif. Past that it's mostly all the same to me and I'm kind of impressed that people pay so much attention to the tiny details (and maybe questioning whether they really do or whether fonts are kind of like wine tasting).

I don't recognize fonts by name, but I certainly notice differences between fonts all the time. Too thin, too bold, too much space between characters, too italic, more or less impact, how difficult it is for me to read a passage with a given font.

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#108

Post by franga2000 » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 8:18 PM UTC

addaon wrote: post #79

alberth wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But how can you differentiate a Helvetica created font file from a font file where I manually traced every Helvetica alphabet identically.

Font cloning is a thing. Font tracing is usually done by printing out the character to be traced at very large scale -- I've seen about 12" x 12" -- and placing it directly on a large digitizing tablet. A sequence of strokes / points is collected for the outline of the character, and then curves of somewhat reduced degree are fit to those strokes / points to both reduce font data size and reduce the impact of errors,…

> This is generally against the terms of service for the initial font, however, which would make it a legal matter...

I doubt there's anything in the ToS for most fonts prohibiting me from rendering a short story that just so happens to contain every character and post it online for everyone to enjoy. I couldn't possibly predict that my friend who doesn't even know the name of the font, let alone ever agreed to any ToS, would take that render and trace all the characters on it.

Note that I generically said "render", not image or raster, since from my understanding, an SVG or vector PDF render of the font (not embedded, but turned into paths) wouldn't be any more copyrightable than a raster, but far easier to clone.

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#109

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 8:29 PM UTC

dhosek wrote: post #90

knowledge-clay wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Typefaces should not be copyrightable. Print ones are not, it makes no sense that digital ones are.

That type designs are not protected is a gross injustice. The time and effort involved in creating a type design is significant. Alas, when the type industry had the resources to lobby to have copyright law changed, they were making a lot of money from stealing each others' designs and chose to lobby the opposite. There was an ill-fated effort in the 90s to lobby for typeface design protection (I was part of it as th…

[deleted]

Re: Helvetica Now Variable

#110

Post by xsmasher » Tue, Aug 17, 2021, 8:30 PM UTC

alberth wrote: post #72

mikedc wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Users agree to a EULA which stipulates how they can and can't use the font. This contract provides the legal basis on which a foundry would pursue someone for suspected misuse. Here's Monotype's EULA for Helvetica Now[0], Section 9 specifically addresses copies and derivative works. From there, it becomes a legal matter. [0] https://www.fonts.com/font/monotype/helvetica-now/licenses#

But how can you differentiate a Helvetica created font file from a font file where I manually traced every Helvetica alphabet identically.

If you copied the .ttf file and sold it, it's a copyright violation just like any software copying. The foundry takes you to court.

If you copy by hand (at what size? at what accuracy? do you include the same hinting and ligatures?) the file will not be bit-for-bit identical. The foundry cannot sue.