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You wouldn't steal a font

fedi.rib.gay

351–360 of 421 posts

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#351
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Copyright, and patents, are not based on moral principles. It's a temporary government license meant to encourage innovation and hustle. Whether it works or not, I don't know. But the only question of morality is if it's immoral to break an arbitrary law, or not.

This is strongly jurisdiction-dependent. US patent and copyright derive from A1S8C8 of the US constitution, "to promote science and useful arts". Much EU law derives from a French tradition based on droight d'auteur , or moral rights. International copyright code (Berne Convention) rips and mashes from both traditions.

A law claiming that something is a "moral right" doesn't make it so, though.

Just as e.g. sodomy laws claiming that something is immoral doesn't make it so.

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#352

The moral background for copyright is in free fall these days. It is quickly turning into one of these things that there are laws for, and everyone thinks it is rediculous, it is never enforced and DE facto not a law. And what a shame that is.

>And what a shame that is. I was with you until this. Copyright is a legal fiction, if it's no longer working the world will adapt. No need for shame to be involved.

All abstract property rights are legal fiction. The notion that you can own, say, a piece of land that you have never even came close to, simply by virtue of a record in some registry somewhere; and, based on that ownership, then restrict the ability of others who actually do live next to it to enter it or otherwise use it, is rather absurd from a "natural right" perspective.

I should note that this isn't even some kind of hot new take. Here's what Thomas Jefferson had to say on the subject:

"It is a moot question whether the origin of any kind of property is derived from nature at all... It is agreed by those who have seriously considered the subject that no individual has, of natural right, a separate property in an acre of land, for instance. By an universal law, indeed, whatever, whether fixed or movable, belongs to all men equally and in common is the property for the moment of him who occupies it; but when he relinquishes the occupation, the property goes with it. Stable ownership is the gift of social law, and is given late in the progress of society."

"A right of property in moveable things is admitted before the establishment of government. A separate property in lands, not till after that establishment. The right to moveables is acknowledged by all the hordes of Indians surrounding us. Yet by no one of them has a separate property in lands been yielded to individuals. He who plants a field keeps possession till he has gathered the produce, after which one has as good a right as another to occupy it. Government must be established and laws provided, before lands can be separately appropriated, and their owner protected in his possession. Till then, the property is in the body of the nation, and they, or their chief as trustee, must grant them to individuals, and determine the conditions of the grant."

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, those things aren't comparable. Truffles have a functional role in a dish. A typeface does not have a meaningful functional role in a document, compared to the high-quality freely-available alternatives. This is like complaining about some kind of specially-carved or dyed truffle.

> A typeface does not have a meaningful functional role in a document 100% incorrect. There are fonts that are made specifically to increase legibility for a dyslexic audience. If that's not a functional role than I don't know what is.

One dyslexia font was tested and found to have the same legibility as normal fonts:

"Dyslexie font neither benefits nor impedes the reading process of children with and without dyslexia."

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11881-017-0154-6

I'm skeptical that any of these fonts actually make a difference. (Although if you like Comic Sans, you might as well continue using it; it doesn't do any harm.)

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#354

Copyright for most (if not all) fonts seems like something that just shouldn’t work. We want things in the public domain, like Shakespeare, and we want derivative works protected. Fonts are tiny differences on public domain work that 90% of people can’t tell. You wouldn’t want Disney to claim every pencil stroke difference on Mikey’s to be subject to different copyright terms, it would become a kind of perpetual copy…

How do you encourage people to continue making new typefaces if anyone could use them immediately? FWIW, it does take significant time to design individual typefaces. It’s not just a set of characters: it’s the character in lowercase and uppercase, how letters appear differently when adjacent to certain other letters, punctuation, etc.

A significant amount of time goes into the process.

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#355
post #22

I don't know if this actually counts as copyright infringement, since typeface shapes are not eligible for copyright in the U.S. (disclaimer: IANAL) so depending on how it was cloned, it might be legal. The more amusing detail, to me, is whether or not XBAND Rough is related to the XBAND peripheral for video game consoles in the 90s. (Fascinating story, it was an add-on that enabled multiplayer over a phoneline on th…

Thanks for emphasising the US perspective, because it matters. IAAL outside the US, and I'm aware in UK and EU law copyright can subsist in typefaces, and there are specific provisions relating to them. Since FACT is a UK Org, taking UK law as an example, see ref. [ ] I personally find it a good example of aging law. It's quite difficult to reconcile the law as drafted (in 1987) with modern digital font uses. Is a PD…

> I personally find it a good example of aging law. It's quite difficult to reconcile the law as drafted (in 1987) with modern digital font uses.

Bizarrely, it seems like the precedent has only gotten stronger since 1987. It was re-affirmed again by the Code of Federal Regulations, § 202.1[1], in 1992. Honestly, I don't fully understand why. I know that U.S. copyright law generally limits the ability to copyright things that do not involve sufficient originality or creativity, but while all typeface outlines are the same basic shapes, there's still plenty of room for creativity.

I also know that the U.S. is also not entirely alone in generally considering typefaces ineligible for copyright protection; I believe Japan also has a similar position. Maybe eventually, it will shift.

> IAAL outside the US, and I'm aware in UK and EU law copyright can subsist in typefaces, and there are specific provisions relating to them. Since FACT is a UK Org, taking UK law as an example, see ref.

Oh, I honestly didn't even realize FACT was a UK organization; I didn't really know a whole lot about them other than the commercial.

That makes this situation a bit more awkward, as Catapult was, IIRC, based in Cupertino, so Catapult may have not been breaking any U.S. copyright laws, even though their typeface would presumably be illicit by UK law. That said, they were possibly breaking Dutch copyright laws, and I'm not sure what happens there. I suppose that comes down to the nitty gritty of how international copyright treaties work, and I am way out of my depth there.

[1]: https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-37/chapter-II/subchapter-...

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, because Saffron is a physical commodity with inherent production costs, supply chain logistics, and a finite supply. A better analogy would be that if you bought a saffron crocus, you shouldn't have to pay a monthly fee to harvest it.

This doesn't mean anything. Things are not generally sold at their bill of materials cost. If you don't want to pay what Monotype is charging, don't use Monotype faces. It's exactly that simple. There a gajillion alternative faces, and a very large number of them are of high quality.

> Things are not generally sold at their bill of materials cost

In a perfectly competitive market things are sold at cost of production + a small markup.

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#357
post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree the average person is likely fine with the fonts on their computer, but this is profoundly misunderstanding the importance of design. Typefaces are incredibly important, and have been for centuries. I'd argue that complaining about font prices is less like a Hermes bag, and more like complaining about high-end ingredients when a supermarket has cheap stuff. Yes, you can get away with cheaper materials when co…

There are roughly zero apps out there that would ”deeply suffer” from having to use freely available and/or system supported fonts.

Seriously. It amazes me what one person's sense of "deep suffering" is compared to another's.

The Total Perspective Vortex comes to mind.

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#358
post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is using some of the thousands of freely available fonts out there even remotely the same as using Calibri for everything? You're making absurd comparisons and not being sincere.

No, I think we're just looking at it from different perspectives. Yes, most people are fine choosing from the fonts available on their computer when writing a document. But that's not what me nor OP are talking about. We're talking about shipping software (like a mobile app), or publishing a blog post. In that case, the best you can specify is either a very common font (Helvetica, etc), or a high-level classification…

Maybe this pedantic snobbery will matter again when we switch back to creative mode, but it all seems highly elitist right now while many are trying to just survive.

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can, entirely legally, make a copy of any font and distribute it freely. You can't copy the font files themselves, but you can make visually indistinguishable new fonts with the same shapes because the shapes are not protected by copyright. Additionally though, some fonts have design patents, which does protect the shape. Unlike copyright which has absolutely crazy expiration (like 150 years occasionally?) these…

So if I already have the file (legally acquired or not), I'm free to use it for print? Cause obviously distributing T-shirts isn't distributing font files?

[deleted]

Re: You wouldn't steal a font

#360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree the average person is likely fine with the fonts on their computer, but this is profoundly misunderstanding the importance of design. Typefaces are incredibly important, and have been for centuries. I'd argue that complaining about font prices is less like a Hermes bag, and more like complaining about high-end ingredients when a supermarket has cheap stuff. Yes, you can get away with cheaper materials when co…

Even under this analogy you're complaining about the price of luxury goods and saying that it's no wonder people shoplift to steal the truffles because they're so darn expensive. If you can't afford the license for the font, your app is small-time enough that you can make do with one of the many, many high-quality fonts that are available for free, there's no need to pirate it. If your app is big enough that the diff…

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