- From: Levantovsky, Vladimir <Vladimir.Levantovsky@MonotypeImaging.com>
- Date: Thu, 18 Jun 2009 12:59:14 -0400
- To: "Patrick Garies" <pgaries@fastmail.us>
- Cc: <www-style@w3.org>
On Wednesday, June 17, 2009 3:36 AM Patrick Garies wrote > > Levantovsky, Vladimir wrote: > > Commercial font vendors DO want to be able to license their fonts > for > > the web use. However, allowing raw TrueType and OpenType fonts be > > used with no protection whatsoever presents too much risk that font > > vendors and foundries are not willing to take. The problem can > easily > > be solved by deploying a font wrapper like EOT that simply reduces > > the risk of font piracy. > > Based on a comment in the Ascender proposal page: > > Zack Weinberg wrote: > > From Mozilla's point of view, the use of patented technology in EOT > > is a show-stopper. We cannot make use of any technology which is > > (known to be) covered by (actively enforced) patents that are not > > licensed under terms compatible with the GPL. We have expressed this > > requirement to the EOT patent holders, but they refuse to publish > > even a proposal for license terms, saying only that /if/ the W3C > > adopts EOT as a standard, then they will issue a license compatible > > with the W3C's patent policy. Unfortunately, W3C-policy compliant > > patent licenses can still be incompatible with the GPL, so that's > > not good enough for us. > > Zack Weinberg wrote: > > I don't speak for the entire company, nor even the team whose call > > it would be ultimately, but my understanding is that if the patent > > issue were resolved we would consider EOT support quite seriously. > > As long as the patent issue is live, though, we are not interested even > > in bothering to figure out whether we have any other objections. > > It's that much of a deal-breaker for us. > I am afraid these statements are not entirely accurate. A number of Recommendations developed by W3C are known to be covered by existing patents, including CSS [1] that is implemented by Mozilla Firefox. One of the greatest values of W3C as an organization is that it developed and implemented a patent policy that all W3C members agree to abide by; and this patent policy guarantees royalty-free access to an IP that is needed to implement and use a technology described in a Recommendation. Evidently, a technology with known IP hasn't been a deal-breaker in the past if the submission of that technology was accompanied by a commitment to make the IP freely available for any implementer of a W3C Recommendation. > According to the Ascender proposal itself, your company owns this > patent: > > > The compression uses patented Agfa (now Monotype Imaging) > technology. > > Do y'all have any intention of addressing this problem? > We have. In 2007, even prior to joining W3C, Monotype Imaging has made a commitment to license the technical specification and use of patents associated with it royalty-free, for worldwide use in implementations of the CSS Recommendation. As a member of W3C, we made the immutable commitment to offer licenses according to the W3C Royalty-Free licensing requirements for any portion of EOT submission [2] that is implemented in a W3C Recommendation. For avoidance of any doubt, Monotype Imaging agrees not to exercise its rights to apply limitations known as a "field of use restriction" if our technology is implemented as a part of a W3C Recommendation, and we are willing to work with any interested party, whether a W3C member or not, to make our IP available on a RF basis for the purpose of developing and prototyping the implementations of a future W3C Recommendation. Vladimir [1] http://www.w3.org/Style/CSS/Disclosures [2] http://www.w3.org/Submission/2008/01/ > — Patrick Garies
Received on Thursday, 18 June 2009 16:59:49 UTC