Re: The unmentionable

FWIW, John, on the analogy or non-analogy to music:

On Wed, 2009-07-29 at 13:54 -0700, John Hudson wrote:

> Fonts are not music. Fonts are tools. Music is a consumable. The market 
> for fonts is a professional design market. The market for music is 
> pretty much everyone. Fonts have value to the customer in relative or 
> absolute exclusivity (the fact that we put a price on exclusivity and 
> clients pay this price is sufficient evidence of this). Music has no 
> value in exclusivity to the customer.

Taking that apart a bit:

> Fonts are not music. 

True.

> Fonts are tools. 

True.

> Music is a consumable. 

False.  Normally, listening to a recording
does not "consume" it.  I think you mean that
people often play a music recording for incidental
reasons rather than to manufacture a commercial
good.  Of course, that is true of fonts as well.



> The market 
> for fonts is a professional design market. The market for music is 
> pretty much everyone. 

The demand for fonts is pretty much everyone as well.
The paying demand for fonts may be as you describe.

> Fonts have value to the customer in relative or 
> absolute exclusivity 

So does music, as any film maker or collector
of Grateful Dead tapes can tell you.

> (the fact that we put a price on exclusivity and 
> clients pay this price is sufficient evidence of this). 

So it is in music, as well.

> Music has no 
> value in exclusivity to the customer.

Generally speaking, not so.

-t

Received on Wednesday, 29 July 2009 21:22:22 UTC