Re: Announcing new font compression project

I never said I agreed with Monotype's position on MTX IP, but pointed 
out that they had not 'finally seen the light', as you put it, Rich. 
What they appear to have got from Google is what they asked for all 
along, assurance that they were not just going to give up their patents 
and then not have the technology used. And they have done what they said 
they would do given that assurance.

> Hmmm.... helping out a billion Windows users using IE6, 7, and 8 
> wasn't enough of a point, I guess.

MTX was licensed by Microsoft and included in EOT, so in what way were 
IE users in particular not helped out by Monotype not releasing the 
patents? Arguably it was all the other browser users who were unhelped 
by Monotype's stance, but that's because those browser makers wanted 
Monotype to release the patents before committing to using the technology.

When options for webfont standards were discussed at TypeCon in Atlanta 
in 2009, there was an impasse between Monotype not wanting to release 
their MTX patents without commitment from the browser makers to using 
it, and the browser makers not wanting to make a commitment to using MTX 
until Monotype had released the patents. At the meeting, Frank Martinez 
pointed out that it would be possible to craft a legal agreement that 
would enable dependent release of the patents. But by that point Erik 
and Tal and Jonathan already had their options on the table, which 
included an already public and widely implemented compression algorithm, 
so MTX was put on the back burner as something that shouldn't hold up 
webfont standardisation. Now it is back on the front burner, both in 
Google's sfntly library -- how do they pronounce that? -- and as a basis 
for the new font compression that Raph describes.

JH

Received on Thursday, 29 March 2012 00:54:24 UTC