Ironically I found the typeface of this post to be poorly rendered, distracting and less pleasant to read than the usual web fare.
Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
71–80 of 145 posts
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
Correct. Article OP is making the argument for a font to be treated as a secret when it is not a secret. Intent and context is important; users aren't putting them up on torrent sites in this case, but simply storing them alongside the rest of their assets in source control. EDIT: TLDR Downloading a publicly available font you don't have a license to use violates copyright.
I guess the distinction is oh Github, a project might have an MIT License with a commercial font. Maybe the focus of this article should be, "be sure to include the license for your fonts, images and other assets in the LICENSE file" ?
This is inadequate with a commercial font: You aren't allowed to redistribute it at all. What you are speaking of is just an issue with open source fonts: Usually open source fonts have different licenses than software, and your license info needs to detail both.
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
Accidentally exposing a folder of copyrighted font files over FTP would probably technically violate the license, even if it was by accident. You're serving the files outside of the licensed use (serving and rendering a webpage). Same as if you accidentally exposed to the internet your home server of legally-created DVD backups. You'd still be violating the license under which you bought the DVDs.
Show me an attorney willing to pursue accidental violators for damages, especially when the asset in question is intended to be publicly served in the course of its use. I would genuinely be interested in case law's stance on this. Also interested in what happens to the value of non-public domain fonts if you require the digital asset to be handled as a secret (and all of the hassle that goes along with that).
Its pretty easy to get decent fonts that are cc licenced.
Toomuchtodo you are not an acidental violator after publishing this comment on hn :)
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
The legal issue is with the repo owner putting it in the repo. The problem is that it's a violation of the copyright license , that's the only reason it's an issue. Downloading the font file from the website is included in the license, so it's fine.
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…
Either: You can open source the website without the font and say you open sourced your website, or if you consider the font part of your website, it means your website isn't open source... even if you put it on GitHub. Because it's a copyright violation for someone to use that font.
Your best bet is to just use open source fonts, of which there are numerous.
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#75If 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 probably trivial). That's basically the reason why WOFF was invented as it doesn't have much technical benefit over compressed TTF files.
The article on the other hand shows that lots of TTF and OTF files can be found on Github which is something the copyright holders certainly have a problem with.
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#76I wonder what would happen if the copyright holder of helvetica sent a DMCA notice to github.
Well, this repository mentioned in the article comments got DMCA'd: https://github.com/r4in/typefaces
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#77This article is:
1) pedantic
2) wrong
3) about fonts
4) written by a copyright narc
I simply do not understand its presence or popularity here.
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
The legal issue is with the repo owner putting it in the repo. The problem is that it's a violation of the copyright license , that's the only reason it's an issue. Downloading the font file from the website is included in the license, so it's fine.
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.
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#79What a depressing thread. The general consensus (at the time of submitting this comment) is that posters don't care if commercial fonts are hosted on GitHub in violation of their licence.
Many professional fonts are the work of a single type designer who may have spent thousands of hours creating the typeface. Modern typefaces can have a dozen or more weights and hundreds of glyphs.
It's hard work and time-consuming to create a professional type family. It's depressing to come here and see how little people care for the work of other professions.
Re: Github became the web's largest font piracy site (2017)
#80If 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…
The article is obviously mainly referring to font files under desktop font licenses that certainly don't usually allow publishing the files on Github or serving them as part of your site.
(While irrelevant: As for the technical difference or lack of between the two, from a license drafting perspective, it wouldn't really matter since you could easily write in the distinction to eg. the allowed purpose part of the license grant.)