Mac Users' Internet Experience to Retain Same Fonts

thefickler sent in this article that opens, "Mac users will continue to see the Internet as it was intended, thanks to the renewal of a font licensing agreement between Microsoft and Apple. At TypeCon2007 Microsoft and Apple announced they have renewed their font licensing agreement, giving Apple users ongoing use of the latest versions of Microsoft Windows core fonts. Back in 1996 Microsoft started the "Core fonts for the Web" initiative. The idea of this initiative was to create a a standard pack of fonts that would be present on all or most computers, allowing web pages to be displayed consistently on different computers. While the project was terminated in 2002, some of the fonts defined as core fonts for the web have gone on to become known as "web safe fonts," and are therefore widely used by Internet developers."

Comments

You aren't a designer

[_merlin]

You, like most users, are not a designer, and don't notice the subtle differences between the proprietary fonts used on a Mac and the free (as in speech and beer) fonts used on Linux. You probably think Arial and Helvetica look the same, too. That's not necessarily a bad thing, and just highlights one reason that most people won't really care whether this license is extended or not - most people just want legible text so they can get the information.

On the other hand, I am a pedant. I pay close attention to fonts. I notice when a single character has been substituted because the specified font didn't have a glyph for a particular codepoint. But I don't care too much for this license, either. I hate Arial with a passion, and wish my Mac would substitute Helvetica, since Arial was actually designed as a Helvetica clone that cost less to license. Verdana was designed to be legible on low-resolution displays. Displays have higher resolutions now, and font rendering technologies have improved. Verdana has outlived its usefulness. Courier New is just plain ugly. I want my fixed-pitch text rendered in Monaco.

So all in all, I don't see how the extension of this license is a good thing for anyone.

A question to the world:

[pizzach]

Has anyone noticed that when you use a Mac for a while, Windows fonts suddenly feel really pixelated with Cleartype?

Then if you use a PC for a while, when you come back to a Mac the fonts feel really blury?