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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Hi Max,<br>
<br>
what follows is Karl Berry's reaction to your concerns, very
slightly edited for the benefit f the list. Karl was/is GUST's
e-foundry's principal advisor in GFL matters so no wonder that I
wholly agree with his thoughts.<br>
<br>
[Maximilian Bloch via font-licensing] :<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:2b696a53-be2f-e697-4449-6848a97710ac@1001fonts.com">
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<p><font face="Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif">As a distributor of
free fonts and also as an avid Linux user for over 20 years I
am in the process of writing an FAQ regarding the <a
href="https://www.gust.org.pl/projects/e-foundry/licenses"
moz-do-not-send="true">GUST font license</a> and I am hoping
someone here could give me feedback by pointing out possible
mistakes or help formulate a better more precise answer?<br>
</font></p>
<blockquote>
<p style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Times New
Roman"; font-size: medium; font-style: normal;
font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal;
font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2;
text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none;
widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;
white-space: normal; text-decoration-thickness: initial;
text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color:
initial;">Q: does the GUST font license (GFL) allow embedding
in a portable digital document like PDF or an ebook?</p>
<p style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Times New
Roman"; font-size: medium; font-style: normal;
font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal;
font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2;
text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none;
widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;
white-space: normal; text-decoration-thickness: initial;
text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color:
initial;">A: Most likely yes, but not 100% reliably. Even if
possibly all authors of GFL licensed fonts may have intended
to allow embedding in portable digital documents, the GUST
font license is unfortunately a bit ambiguous. For sure, fonts
licensed under the GUST font license (GFL) can be used freely
and restrictions only apply to<span> </span><a
href="https://www.latex-project.org/lppl/lppl-1-3c/#conditions-on-distribution-and-modification"
moz-do-not-send="true">modification and distribution</a><span> </span>of
the font files themselves.</p>
<p style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Times New
Roman"; font-size: medium; font-style: normal;
font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal;
font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2;
text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none;
widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;
white-space: normal; text-decoration-thickness: initial;
text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color:
initial;">The actual question then would be: "Is embedding a
font into a PDF or ebook considered a modification of the
font?" While technically this can be the case, as some bits
and bytes may be altered, the intended visual outcome of using
the font remains the same. Also considering that the font is
not intended for use outside of the created document,
distribution of the document does not have to be viewed as a
distribution of the font.</p>
<p style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: "Times New
Roman"; font-size: medium; font-style: normal;
font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal;
font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: 2;
text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none;
widows: 2; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;
white-space: normal; text-decoration-thickness: initial;
text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-color:
initial;">The GUST font license (GFL) does not explicitly
depict embedding, so the license could raise questions among
technical savvy users and interpretation of the license
becomes a matter of opinion. This is the reason why the<span> </span><a
href="https://spdx.org/licenses/Font-exception-2.0.html"
moz-do-not-send="true">font exception</a><span> </span>clause
has been added to the similar GNU GPL license and also why the
similar<span> </span><a
href="https://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&id=OFL"
moz-do-not-send="true">SIL OFL license</a><span> </span>was
born, where embedding is<span> </span><a
href="https://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&id=ofl-faq_web#dc00d574"
moz-do-not-send="true">explicitly allowed</a>.</p>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<br>
[Karl Berry, private communication]: <br>
<blockquote type="cite">
<pre class="moz-quote-pre" wrap="">1. We certainly intend to allow embedding. A font license that does not
permit embedding, both "whole font" and subsetted, seems next to useless
to me, nowadays.
2. Embedding a whole font seems non-problematic to me. I'm skeptical of
"bits and bytes may be altered". Bits and bytes may be altered by any
copying method for any material -- consider DOS CRLF vs. Unix LF, for
instance. Processing a PDF through Ghostscript, which everyone does,
will generally change the exact bytes of included images (possibly
problematically, as Jacko knows, but that's a different topic 😄, but no
one thinks that changes the license of the document, or is not
allowed. Etc.
3. Embedding a subset of a font, which is the interesting case, is more
problematic. I think that has to be considered a modification of the
original. Fortunately the LPPL (of course) allows modification, or it
would not be a free software license. Furthermore, the fonts themselves
will (should) contain metadata that gives the original source (url) of the
font, which to my mind satisfies the crucial LPPL condition 6.d.2:
2. Information that is sufficient to obtain a complete,
unmodified copy of the Work.
Ergo, it seems to me that there is a reasonable argument that GFL'd
fonts can be partially (or wholly) embedded in documents, without the
user needing to do anything explicit. Which is the outcome we
want. There are certainly counterarguments and alternate interpretations
which would forbid embedding, but we don't need to endorse or address
them, IMHO.
4. I'm skeptical of inducing FUD because of "interpretation". Every word
of every license is open to interpretation. Linus interprets the GPL
differently than the FSF. If a user wishes to shoot themselves in the
foot by refusing to embed LPPL-d fonts, fine, that's their choice.
5. We can't "fix" it by adding an exception (as you somewhat imply that
we should), or doing anything else that would make the GFL no longer the
same as the LPPL, legally speaking. That would be a far worse outcome
than anything else, triggering a full license review by everyone, to the
detriment of all concerned.
6. Thus my suggestion would be to add an item to
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.gust.org.pl/projects/e-foundry/licenses">https://www.gust.org.pl/projects/e-foundry/licenses</a>
stating that we believe the LPPL/GFL, as written, permits embedding,
either in whole or in part. With a link to the font-licensing archived
message, as you suggest. And that that is our desired outcome.</pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
As to the last point (6): this has yet to be done and will, but
don't hold your breath.<br>
<br>
Best,<br>
-- Jerzy<br>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">Jerzy Ludwichowski
GUST, Vice President</pre>
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