[Foundation-l] Fonts

[Robert Scott Horning]

Brion Vibber wrote:

> Zachary Harden wrote:
>
>> Dear Gerard,
>>
>> That sounds like a good idea, but I do have a question: what do you mean
>> by making fonts "free"?
>
>
> Fonts are under copyright unless you know otherwise.
>
> If we're to provide downloadable fonts to readers, they'll need to be
> freely licensed for distribution and use. (Note that many fonts you
> might download off random web sites may be restricted -- 'shareware' or
> non-commercial use or otherwise.)
>
> There are many free font projects out there, though I don't know how
> good the coverage for some languages is.
>
> -- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)

There is a real issue right now with Han (Chinese/Japanese/Korean/etc.) 
fonts that support the full Unicode range...even code points to 64,000. 
 Microsoft allowed its Unicode font to be downloaded for free---for a 
time, but it is now down, and illegal to copy. You can now only get it 
when you purchase a Chinese language expansion pack. (if you dig on the 
web, there are a few "illegal archives of it, but nothing official.) 
 There are several others that are available, but almost all of them are 
commercial with substantial licensing fees.  One of the best current 
fonts is at:

http://home.att.net/~jameskass/

He only asks for a $5 registration fee, and it is a very good font that 
includes many code points for several languages including braille and 
signing language fonts (as defined in the Unicode standard), but 
unfortunately it is not GFDL compatable in terms of common distribution, 
and Mr. Kass is retaining copyright on the font.  I don't know of any 
other similar font or free download font that even approaches what this 
font can accomplish.  IMHO this is something that needs to be started as 
some sort of free content project, but I would have no idea where to 
even begin.  I thought I saw a GNU project that was working toward this 
end some time ago, but I can't seem to find the page.

-- 
Robert Scott Horning