Readable Web » Copyright

Old Farts, New Media

Richard Fink — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 15:48:00 +0000

Rochester, New York

Over the past two days here at the Future Of Reading Conference at RIT there’s been two talks by publishing industry insiders – Molly Barton of Penguin Books and Jane Friedman, former longtime President and CEO of Harper Collins Publishers Worldwide.

There’s a big difference in age between them. One of them is young and one of them is, well, probably a grandmother. (Didn’t ask, but she mentioned she had four sons.) One of them understands where the publishing of books is headed and the other one seemed a little stodgy, frankly.

Here’s what they look like. Guess who’s clued in, who’s not:

Jane Friedman, Clued In

In the days of print, competition between the major publishers could afford to be a “gentlemanly” affair. But in these days of digital and print-on-demand, it’s guerrilla warfare. Jane Friedman brought up the fact that there’s 80,000 independent publishers in the USA. Twice. She gets it. And she gets the change in mood, too. It’s not just digital distribution, there’s a change in expectations. Many readers want to feel a relationship, a connection to the author. A name on a book cover isn’t enough. And readers want to get the book they want, whenever they want it, on whatever device they’re using, wherever they are. She gets that, too.

Jane Friedman is co-founder of start-up publisher Open Road Integrated Media. And for the first time, they are publishing digitally, with no accompanying print edition, Negotiating With Evil, by Mitchell Reiss.
Let me say that again: no simultaneous print edition.

Hey Jane, How ‘Bout DRM?

After her presentation, I asked Friedman if all of Open Road’s titles were DRM’d (Kindle, Nook, etc) and she said that at the moment, all of them were. I asked if they were considering releasing anything under trusting, open licenses and she said it wasn’t out of the question but that Open Road is a very new company, give it time, and certainly anything and everything that gets books into the hands of the most readers and generates revenue for the authors is on the table.

OK. Maybe someday I’ll be able to quote a paragraph or two without jumping through hoops. (Or, alternatively, downloading the cracked edition which we all know will exist. Not condoning, just saying.) But in the meantime, it’s refreshing to see somebody with long experience thinking anew and acting anew.

Next, more from the conference: Chris Anderson of Wired, Jon Orwant of Google Books, and my new hero, old fart Richard Lanham, Professor Emeritus at UCLA.

Typekit And Copyright Fraud, Say It Ain’t So

Richard Fink — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 17:55:36 +0000

It is in the nature of fences to enclose everything within. While writing a post about Fontshop’s Web FontFonts, I followed a link and in trying to find out what fonts were being used, I found this:

/*The fonts and font delivery service used on this website are
provided via Typekit, and are subject to the End User License
Agreement entered into by the website owner. All other parties
are explicitly restricted from using, in any manner, the Services,
Licensed Fonts, or Licensed Content. Details about using Typekit,
the EULA, and information about the fonts are listed below.

@allow getuproot.com
@allow www.getuproot.com
@allow uat.getuproot.com

@name FF DIN Web
@licenseurl http://typekit.com/fonts/cde51de568/eula

@name League Gothic
@vendorname The League of Moveable Type
@vendorurl http://www.theleagueofmoveabletype.com/
@licenseurl http://typekit.com/fonts/bf5a95cb8b/eula

(c) 2010 Small Batch Inc. */

Any ordinary reading of this notice would lead to the conclusion that “Licensed Fonts” or “Licensed Content” refers to the two fonts listed: FF DIN Web and League Gothic. And that Typekit is claiming rights over those fonts. (Go ahead, read it. Or read it again. Don’t take my word for it.) The message of the notice is clear: this stuff is ours, hands off. To leave no doubt as to its legal nature, there’s the (c) copyright symbol and company name at the bottom.

But League Gothic Is A Free, Open-Source Font

The only problem is that one of the fonts listed is League Gothic, a free font offered by the League Of Movable Type, an organization dedicated to producing free, open-source fonts!
How is it that Typekit is claiming rights to an open-source font? And one from an organization whose intention and purpose seems to be the philosophical antithesis of what Typekit is about?

Note: Hopefully, the folks at Typekit will respond with a reasonable, non-legalistic, and acceptable explanation. I have met and spoken at length with two of the co-founders of Typekit, Bryan Mason and Ryan Carver. I am making no assertions about motives or ill-intent. The facts are the facts, that’s all. I just don’t get it.

What’s The Harm?

The question is: are the rights of creators whose intention is to share freely as worthy of protection as the rights of creators who ask for compensation? It’s clear that the creators of League Gothic intend it to be a resource free and open to all. Therefore, I find Typekit’s legal notice – which defeats that intention – something worth questioning. Further, League Gothic is released under the SIL Open Source Font license. If the SIL license permits this kind of obfuscation, I’d say it’s time to amend the license. Even further, Typekit may be creating a liability for the owners of the site, which is surely something they might want to look into.

What’s ironic about this, is that when it was first launched, one of Typekit’s main selling points was that it offered an answer to the issue of font copyright on the web. A way for font designers to feel comfortable about offering their products and a way for web designers to make use of them without concern about legal hassle. Here, we see the flip side of the coin and I can’t say I was surprised to find it. Especially now, in the age of digital distribution, copyright has become about protecting the few at the expense of the public. Copyright is long on protecting those who demand restriction and very, very short on protecting the rights of those who wish to share. The free and open always tends to get sucked up into the vortex of restriction. It was this that made open-source EULAs a necessity.

One of the great things about the web is its technological transparency. If you see a technique you like, it’s easy to “View Source” or use a tool like Firebug to see what’s going on and then take it, build on it, and others are free to do the same.

About Copyright Fraud

Copyright protection for intellectual property is designed to insure that the rightful owner of an original work enjoys the benefits of that work. These benefits include the right to control the duplication of the work and the entitlement to collect any monetary gain from the work. Copyright fraud is an infringement of this right in that the profits from a piece of intellectual property are unfairly diverted to an individual or organization that is not entitled to the benefit.
In addition to civil remedies, intentional copyright fraud also carries criminal penalties. The intent to commercially distribute or reproduce the intellectual property to obtain financial gain must be established, and the intellectual property must be valued at more than $1000. Evidence of reproduction is not enough to establish a criminal charge of copyright fraud. Copyright fraud includes unlawfully placing a copyright claim over material that is often actually in the public domain. It also includes unlawfully removing a copyright symbol from intellectual property. In each instance, all unlawfully obtained profits must be forfeited. In addition, a fine of up to $2500 may be imposed for each offense.

So anyway, what’s going on here? Are the pirate-fighters, in a sense, pirates? At the least, it’s a mystery. And to the folks at the League Of Movable Type: how do you see this?

An Open Letter To Retail Font Vendors

Richard Fink — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 01:10:48 +0000

Call me Webmail.

I make web pages. And now that the latest browsers are supporting @font-face, I’ve been taking to the sites where fonts are sold.

I’ve never needed to go shopping for fonts before. And I’m distressed by what I see. And I’m distressed by what I don’t see.
First, let me tell you what I want: I want to see a browser-friendly and well-categorized selection of fonts. I want prices that make sense within the overall cost structure of the sites that I make. And I want licensing terms that give me the flexibility to do what I need to do. I don’t design signs, or magazines, or advertisements. Those folks have their needs, and I have mine. I make web pages. If you don’t have anything to sell me, or you just don’t want to deal with customers unfamiliar with your ways, that’s OK. Just tell me up front and I’ll move on. But please don’t waste my time. Or lead me on. Or ask me to fill out a special form or in any other way subject me to a level of scrutiny greater than your other customers. I won’t be vetted. I won’t be frisked. I’ll just get angry. And I’ll Twitter about it. I like Twitter.

So let me say it again one more time: I want a browser-friendly and well-categorized selection, at prices that make sense to me and my clients, and with liberal licensing. This is what I need.

Just so we understand each other, here’s some dos and dont’s:

Show Me Browser-Friendly Fonts

By browser friendly, I mean fonts that look halfway decent in a browser. I know that quality will differ from font to font. But if you have fonts designed strictly for print work, that look like hell in a browser, weed them out. I don’t want to see them. Fonts either look OK, or they don’t. Details like hinting, no hinting, TrueType, OpenType CFF – that’s your business, not mine. If I’m using Flash, or Cufón, or some other font embedding technology, I already know my choices are greater and I’ll look at your other fonts then.

Show Me A Web Font Specimen

I can’t tell what your font looks like in a browser unless I view it in a browser. How you do that is up to you. Find a way or don’t waste my time. Perhaps some sort of glyph-limited set is the answer. Or one without kerning. Or perhaps the methods developed by font-obfuscation services like Typekit can be used. Or maybe a combination of these. But if you can’t or won’t take the time and effort to show me an accurate sample of what I’m buying, I won’t be buying. At least not from you. I make web pages. It’s very competitive. My clients don’t make allowances for me, so I can’t make them for you, either.

Tell Me What The License Is Up Front

I want to know what the web licensing terms are before I do anything. In plain language. With a link to it on the home page and not buried away somewhere. If you feel the need for legalese, have it follow the plain language version. If the EULA says that if my site succeeds I have to come back and give you more money. I’ll probably walk. More visitors does not necessarily mean more cash. If the EULA contains all sorts of “if this, then that” provisions that require a lawyer to interpret and an assistant to keep track of, goodbye. In my world, I usually buy once and then I’m done. I’m good to go. That’s it. Adios, amigos.

Don’t Restrict Me To Pre-Processed Files

If for some reason you insist on delivering only WOFF or EOT files, I’m not interested. I’ll just convert them to TTF or OTF anyway so you might as well leave the conversions up to me. Unless it’s as a part of a courtesy package with the source files included. I might need or want to install these fonts in the operating system as part of the development process. I won’t inconvenience myself for you. If this bothers you, like I said, it’s OK. Tell me the licensing terms up front, and I won’t hold it against you.

Don’t Ask Me To Enforce Same-Origin Restrictions

Like I said, I’m not going to agree to assume additional costs just to please you. And sometimes I don’t have complete control over the administration of the server. I can probably comply with a request to not enable hot-linking to my site, but that’s all I can or am willing to do.

To sum up:
I don’t find anything I’ve asked you to do to be unreasonable. But even so, you may disagree. You may feel that somehow, you can reap the benefits of digital distribution without accepting the disadvantages. If so, I wish you luck with that, and all the best.

Mozilla Announces Support For Web Open Font Format (WOFF) In Firefox 3.6

Richard Fink — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 16:01:10 +0000

Mozilla has announced that support for the Web Open Font Format (WOFF) will be a part of Firefox upgrade 3.6.

Conceived by Mozilla’s own Jonathan Kew and font-designer/programmers Erik van Blokland and Tal Leming, WOFF addresses the concerns about unlicensed distribution expressed by many font-designers and, at the same time, holds the promise of a web-friendly, interoperable font format for the future.

There is a strong assumption among those closely following the issue that Microsoft will follow suit in the next version of Internet Explorer, making WOFF – regardless of its adoption as a standard by the W3C – the defacto web-font standard going forward.

Designed, in part, to be an improved successor to Internet Explorer’s Embedded Open Type (EOT), Mozilla’s documentation sums up the advantages of WOFF as these:

1. The font data is compressed, so sites using WOFF will use less bandwidth and will load faster than if they used equivalent uncompressed TrueType or OpenType files.
2. Many font vendors that are unwilling to license their TrueType or OpenType format fonts for use on the web will license WOFF format fonts. This improves availability of fonts to site designers.
3. Both proprietary and free-software browser vendors like the WOFF format, so it has the potential of becoming a truly universal, interoperable font format for the web, unlike other current font formats.

For the technical, the specification for WOFF is here.

A set of command-line tools for creating WOFF files has been posted by co-creator Tal Leming for the purpose of comments, suggestions, and tests.

Update: Kernest Web Font Service Now Serving WOFF

Ain’t no flies on Kernest’s Garrick Van Buren. As was announced on
Kernest’s blog:

WOFF is a compressed font format meaning a better @font-face experience in Firefox through faster font transfers and shorter FOUT times.
Now if you’re browsing with one of the Firefox (3.6) Nightly Builds on a site using fonts from Kernest – you’ll receive a WOFF instead of a TTF or OTF.

Kernest is not only a free service, but it’s an invaluable online viewer and source of information for free fonts of all kinds. We should have added a “Linkworthy” link to Kernest here on Readable Web a long time ago.
As of today, we have.

Copyright Reform: Stop, Thief!

Richard Fink — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 03:39:17 +0000

Until about a year ago, like most people, I never paid much attention to copyright law. Sure, I remember Napster. And I knew the recording, film, and publishing industries were constantly complaining about what the web had done to their businesses. But that was about it. Whatever notions I had were old fashioned and based mainly on my experiences as a musician and songwriter long before there were personal computers.

And then I got tangled in the readable web. Browsing around, I discovered law professor James Boyle’s book The Public Domain in a free PDF edition and I started reading. About one chapter into it, I discovered that it was also available from Feedbooks.com where I was able to create a PDF to match the size of the screen on my iRex 1000S; the iRex being a true book-sized open platform e-reader where I can store books that I actually own and that Amazon can’t decide to take away.

Feedbooks and the iRex made the text easier on my eyes, and then James Boyle’s words began to open them. Since then, I’ve read quite a lot about copyright. If you care about the future of reading and living in a free and open society, there are a lot of things about copyright law that are deeply disturbing.

Just Who Is Stealing From Who, Here?

To bring up just one of the bizarre and outrageous situations copyright law has put us in, here’s a passage explaining the problem of “orphan” works:

Go to the Library of Congress catalog. It is online at http://catalog.loc.gov/. This is an astounding repository of material—not just books and periodical, but pictures, films, and music. The vast majority of this material, perhaps as much as 95 percent in the case of books, is commercially unavailable. The process happens comparatively quickly. Estimates suggest that a mere twenty eight years after publication 85 percent of the works are no longer being commercially produced. (We know that when U.S. copyright required renewal after twenty-eight years, about 85 percent of all copyright holders did not bother to renew. This is a reasonable, if rough, guide to commercial viability.)
Yet because the copyright term is now so long, in many cases extending well over a century, most of twentieth-century culture is still under copyright; copyrighted but unavailable. Much of this, in other words, is lost culture. No one is reprinting the books, screening the films, or playing the songs. No one is allowed to. In fact, we may not even know who holds the copyright. Companies have gone out of business. Records are incomplete or absent. In some cases, it is even more complicated. A film, for example, might have one copyright over the sound track, another over the movie footage, and another over the script. You get the idea. These works—which are commercially unavailable and also have no identifiable copyright holder—are called “orphan works.” They make up a huge percentage of our great libraries’ holdings. For example, scholars estimate that the majority of our film holdings are orphan works. For books, the estimates are similar. Not only are these works unavailable commercially, there is simply no way to find and contact the person who could agree to give permission to digitize the work or make it available in a new form.

Problems like these rate some attention, I’d say. A few days ago I added Copyfight to the “Linkworthy” blogroll here on this site. There you’ll find lots of good links and steady coverage of the latest inanities from the world of Copyright law.

On it’s home page, Copyfight says this:

Here we’ll explore the nexus of legal rulings, Capitol Hill policy-making, technical standards development, and technological innovation that creates — and will recreate — the networked world as we know it. Among the topics we’ll touch on: intellectual property conflicts, technical architecture and innovation, the evolution of copyright, private vs. public interests in Net policy-making, lobbying and the law, and more.

Why Copyfight? Well, on a page titled What’s A Copyfighter?, it says, among other things:

“…If ‘copyfighter’ means ‘one who fights against bad copyright laws (and for smarter business practices),’ then I am a copyfighter.”

And so too, it would seem, am I.

As its extensive archives will attest, Copyfight was at one time home to several writers on copyright and Intellectual Property. But they have moved on. Today, the blog is the product of a lone-eagle, Dr. Alan Wexelblat. I’ve been subscribing via RSS for awhile and the site has consistently offered an honest and sober minded window on events and ideas that will have a great impact on what we read, where we can read it, and how much we pay to do so in the years to come. Not the end all and be all on the subject by any stretch, but worth a feed and a read.

In no time at all, I’ll bet you’ll be a Copyfighter, too.

Typekit And Copyright Fraud, Say It Ain’t So