From: Deborah Goldsmith (goldsmit@apple.com)
Date: Wed Dec 03 2003 - 15:48:19 EST
As far as I know there is no legal issue with adding hints to fonts.
Any legal issue around font hinting is going to relate only to the
software which takes fonts and produces rendered glyphs on a display
device, not to the fonts themselves.
Apple does not ask font developers to pay royalties for anything
related to font development or distribution. So if you add hints to a
font, no, you do not owe Apple any royalties, nor is there any other
legal issue I'm aware of. We *want* people to produce high-quality
fonts, including high-quality cross-platform fonts.
Deborah Goldsmith
Manager, Fonts / Unicode liaison
Apple Computer, Inc.
goldsmit@apple.com
On Dec 3, 2003, at 10:38 AM, Raymond Mercier wrote:
>
> Philippe Verdy writes
>> Simple: for now the fonts are in beta, and do not include the hinting
>> instructions. This may be in development, but faces some legal issues
>> with Apple patents. So until there's a patent-free hinting mechanism,
>> for use in fonts, or Apple agrees with a royaltee-free license on
>> hinting mechanisms, hinted fonts cannot be freely distributed.
>>
> What is the legal position if these fonts are taken into Fontlab and
> rehinted ?
>
> Surely if I make my own hinted font in Fontlab I do not owe royalties
> to
> Apple.
>
> Raymond Mercier
>
>
>
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