Help with licensing questions

[Nicolas Mailhot]

Le Dim 15 février 2009 18:47, Stephen Hartke a écrit :
> Nicolas (M),

Hi Stephen,

> Thanks for your response to my email!  More below.

Responses are free here :)

> On Thu, Feb 12, 2009 at 9:51 AM, Nicolas Mailhot
> <nicolas.mailhot at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> Basically, I don't think the format of your font should drive your
>> licensing decisions. If the GPL is appropriate for the metatype
>> version it's appropriate for the OTF version. Just "it looks more
>> like
>> software as usual" is a weak reason.
>>
>
> I think that the license of my font _should_ be driven by the format,
> or,
> more specifically, by the information that is being released and
> reused for
> making a derivative work.
>
> Releasing MetaType1 sources under the GPL and the OTF file under the
> OFL seems to accomplish exactly what I want:

Please consider that you are the only one who can do this, and any
downstream that will use your GPL sources will have no choice but to
have the produced fonts under the GPL too.

Which won't be embeddable if you forget the right clause.
-1 for the GPL

*This* is why I wrote your licensing decisions should not be driven by
your (source) format. Your downstreams do not have the luxury to
re-licence when they need to change the font format, they'll have to
use the same license as the sources they work from, so any licensing
model that is adherent to the produced format is broken by design.

>
> If someone makes a derivative font by modifying the sources and
> distributes
> it, then I want them to be required to distribute their modified
> sources,
> just as the GPL requires.  It doesn't seem to me that the OFL would
> require this.

Well, I disagree with Nicolas S. the OFL is satisfying here :p

> If however someone modifies the OTF file directly using FontForge,
> then using the GPL is rather nonsensical since there is no source.

That is arguing only binary compiled files can be (L)GPLed, when the
evidence is lots of interpreted files authors are happy with this
license for their perl/python/js/shell scripts.

> In that case, the OFL seems to be the perfect license.

Not really :(

BTW, had the source and build scripts been clearly identified as
necessary from the start on, they'd be mirrored today in all the
distros shipping your fonts and would not have been lost :(

-1 for the OFL.

Sincerely,

-- 
Nicolas Mailhot