Bug 472635
Summary: | Google Droid fonts licensing | ||
---|---|---|---|
Product: | [Fedora] Fedora | Reporter: | Nicolas Mailhot <nicolas.mailhot> |
Component: | distribution | Assignee: | Tom "spot" Callaway <tcallawa> |
Status: | CLOSED UPSTREAM | QA Contact: | Bill Nottingham <notting> |
Severity: | medium | Docs Contact: | |
Priority: | medium | ||
Version: | rawhide | CC: | dannyb, dcantrell, fonts-bugs, herrold, katzj, rex.camposagrado, rvokal |
Target Milestone: | --- | ||
Target Release: | --- | ||
Hardware: | All | ||
OS: | Linux | ||
Whiteboard: | |||
Fixed In Version: | Doc Type: | Bug Fix | |
Doc Text: | Story Points: | --- | |
Clone Of: | Environment: | ||
Last Closed: | 2008-12-09 23:02:11 UTC | Type: | --- |
Regression: | --- | Mount Type: | --- |
Documentation: | --- | CRM: | |
Verified Versions: | Category: | --- | |
oVirt Team: | --- | RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host: | |
Cloudforms Team: | --- | Target Upstream Version: | |
Embargoed: | |||
Bug Depends On: | |||
Bug Blocks: | 182235, 446451, 475661 |
Description
Nicolas Mailhot
2008-11-22 10:39:25 UTC
Not sure why you think "Google won't step down to replying to solicitations by mere mortals". Every query i'm aware of about this situation has been answered (some by me personally). If you sent a query that was not answered, please privately provide me details so i can make sure it doesn't happen again. In any case, the licensing info embedded on the fonts was simply wrong when it was pushed out, and is being corrected. They are licensed under Apache 2.0. The fixed TTF files should be pushed to GIT soon, if they aren't there already. (In reply to comment #1) . > Every query i'm aware of about this situation has been answered (some by me > personally). Thank you for the answer. I guess is was my frustration speaking, the Droid fonts have been announced a long time ago, and the situation is still not fixed > In any case, the licensing info embedded on the fonts was simply wrong when it > was pushed out, and is being corrected. > They are licensed under Apache 2.0. > The fixed TTF files should be pushed to GIT soon, if they aren't there already. They aren't today. I don't know if we can touch them at all before they are fixed. BTW, I hadn't noticed but it seems even wikipedia is aware of the problem http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Droid_(font)#License_controversy P.P.S. A nice versionned tarball or zip with a detached license text on an official site that does not require digging in git to find the fonts would be appreciated Are the fonts at version 1.0.107, or will the next font dump use the same versions? I've spoken with Chris DiBona at Google on this issue, and he assures me that this is simply an accidental oversight. We should see an updated font drop in the next week (this week is an holiday week in the US, which may temporarily delay it). Nicolas, we'll just wait for this new drop to package these up. This bug appears to have been reported against 'rawhide' during the Fedora 10 development cycle. Changing version to '10'. More information and reason for this action is here: http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/BugZappers/HouseKeeping Fixing version to align with rawhide again. Sorry for the noise. Chris DiBona at Google let me know that the change has happened upstream: http://review.source.android.com/5401 Verified the new files. Thanks to everyone involved. Posted the package review request in bug #475661 Ascender just released OpenType Pro versions of the Droid fonts here: http://www.droidfonts.com . This might be interesting to creative professionals who would like to use the Droid fonts in their design projects. It is worth noting that the "Pro" fonts are not under a Free License. While the necessity for Ascender to offer the Droid Pro fonts under a free license may not be extremely well received by the open-source community, please be aware that while we partner with several open-source providers and are happy to build fonts for these partners, no business model exists for font vendors if we were to release our IP directly under an open license. For the record, Our http://www.DroidFonts.com site does not offer any fonts under any free license. We have taken the Droid fonts under Apache v2 and have enhanced the Droid fonts as allowed under Apache v2. We are now offering the enhanced Droid Pro fonts under a proprietary EULA for a license fee, with proper credit being given to the underlying Apache covered portion of the fonts which we are licensing. We built the Droid Pro fonts because the professional graphic design and creative market was asking for them (in part to support the Android effort), but these users require enhanced character ranges and sometimes want OTF format fonts. There are also OEMs which require additional language support and additional weights and styles of Droid. From our perspective, this is a win-win situation. The open community has another outstanding set of fonts (to add to the Liberation fonts we built for Red Hat) and we have the opportunity to satisfy demands for additional Droid support. We see this as very much like the business models of the Linux OS providers, who often supply a good base OS for free and then are able to stay in business by providing enhancements and support. I hope this helps to explain what we're up to. No, I understand what you're doing. I may disagree with your motivations (I do work for a company whose entire model is based around FOSS licensing), but I understand them. My post was intended to clarify to anyone who might come across your post and start to package the Pro fonts for submission in Fedora, as I would have to immediately block such an action on licensing grounds. Correction to my previous Comment #12: While the necessity for Ascender to (not) offer the Droid Pro fonts under a free license may not be extremely well received by the open-source community, |