Re[3]: Why TrueDoc?

On: Wed, 04 Apr 96 18:33:02 est    
glen@met.bitstream.com wrote:

>     Intellectual property rights have to be protected on the internet. 
>     Bitstream TrueDoc technology is the ONLY font technology that protects 
>     those rights while expressing the image that the fonts were intended 
>     to produce.

This statement seems to me an oxymoron. Glen, do you contend that A) TrueDoc
protects font designers by freely distributing a high quality functional
equivalent of their work, or B) TrueDoc  protects font designers by freely
distributing a poor quality functional equivalent of their work?

I believe that statement B is a more accurate representation, but in either case
the choice of distribution has been removed from the designer and given to the
document creator. How is this better than leaving the embedding choice to the
designer?

>     As far as quality, TrueDoc provides indistinguishable quality or 
>     better in the case of poorly designed fonts.

Oh joy! TrueDoc will improve upon my designs! I think what you meant to say here
is that it will improve upon the hinting of poorly hinted fonts. Of this I have
no doubt. But to make this statement, you must concede that for the highest
quality TrueType fonts (the only kind I care to make) the conversion which
TrueDoc makes will be inferior to the original. Could you please explain once
more how this is a service to us type designers?

And as far as the legality of what TrueDoc is doing, I find it highly suspect.
How is the use of TrueDoc any different from, oh... lets say taking some of your
Bitstream fonts, converting them from PS to TT (or TT to PS) with Fontographer,
and embedding those new instantiations in the document?

Don't tell me. You already addressed this back on 3/29 in a different post to
this group...
>   It doesn't even access the original
>   font files themselves.  Instead, TrueDoc captures the character shapes 
>   that result from executing the fonts

So are you saying TrueDoc wraps outlines around rasterized bitmap images, or
that it converts the outlines by accessing the Type 1 or TrueType rasterizer,
rather than reading the font data directly from the disk. I find it unlikely
that you are attempting the former. In the case of the latter, if you are ever
reading font data, whether it is from disk or from the rasterizer, you are more
than likely infringing upon my copyright of the digitized representations of my
typeface designs. How can you suggest that the automatic conversion and free
distribution of my font data is ethical, let alone legal? 

Inquisitively yours,

Thomas Rickner
Monotype Typography Inc
tomr@ny.monotypeusa.com

Disclaimer- The thoughts expressed here are my own, and do not represent those
of my employer.

Received on Friday, 5 April 1996 08:51:10 UTC