Re: cutting to the chase

> After several hundred mail messages that
> discussion has failed to find consensus on
> even the most basic principles.

Actually, there seems to be increasing consensus on a lot of things.
It is very reassuring.

> "most professional font makers" is both in
> dispute

Only by you, as far as I can tell. I'd be curious as to what evidence
you would be basing your contrary opinion on.

I've been involved in active discussions with dozens of professional
font makers, including (but not limited to) many of the largest as
well as most of the best-known smaller vendors. The consensus is a
heck of a lot stronger than "most" — it's nearly universal.

> and not obviously relevant in the absence
> of ANY proposal that they agree with

Actually, most professional font makers are happy with EITHER .webfont
or EOT Light, and many have said so. The problem is not finding a
proposal they agree with. It's that they aren't quite able to form an
organized group and decide on a single proposal to push. Probably most
of them would be fine with ZOT as well....

> and around
> which the potential for consensus is clear.

I can't tell what you base that judgment on, but my assessment is
quite different.

> No, it's not laughable.  No alternative is
> emerging and if their only remaining objection
> is "we won't play", well, that's not much of an
> objection in the long view.

Sure it is. Their reasons for "not playing" are that they don't see
that they can continue to have a business in that universe.

> The procedural question is whether or not you
> will raise formal Objection to a potential WG's
> recommendation to require TTF/OTF (perhaps with
> or perhaps without same-origin+cors), and if so
> what the content of that Objection will be.

I will bet you dinner at a very nice restaurant that if it gets that
far, Adobe, Monotype and Microsoft will all Object.

I would expect that if non-members are allowed to raise objections,
you will have literally dozens, probably scores of type foundries
joining in Objection.

Whether or not those objections will all be of a nature that will
matter to the W3C is another matter, of course. I imagine the major
players will be savvy enough to do it properly.

Cheers,

T

Received on Monday, 3 August 2009 05:28:00 UTC