Slashdot Mirror
Font Maker Sues Universal Music Over 'Pirated' The Vamps Logo (torrentfreak.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Universal Music Group is being sued by HypeForType, which accuses the record label of using "pirated" copies of its fonts for the logo of The Vamps. The font is widely used for artwork, promotion material and merchandising of the popular British band, and the font creator is looking for a minimum of $1.25 million in damages. The font maker has filed a lawsuit accusing the major label of using its "Nanami Rounded" and "Ebisu Bold" fonts without permission. According to a complaint, filed in a New York federal court, Universal failed to obtain a proper license for its use, so they are essentially using pirated fonts.
"But our piracy is different! We're a big corporation, we're allowed to do this!!!"
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
Hmm.....now I have to go research and look up who "The Vamps" are.....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Live by the DMCA...die by the DMCA
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
Please don't tempt them. Ever since it was shown that Google et al have survived thanks to safe harbor provisions, that's been a target. Anything to prompt them to lobby against it more than they currently are is a bad idea, imho.
What crazy-ass font license does not allow derivative works? I can understand if it's a web font or PDFs or something where you are distributing copies of the font itself - but t-shirts, logos, and images? That's ridiculous.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Is he claiming each letter is one count of violation? Like RIAA typically does?
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Universal designed the logo. Some graphic design firm did, and they may or may not have had a suitable licence, (my guess is not, but basically "prove it.")
While I'm all for rooting for the little guy, the idea of maintaining some "chain of custody" for every typeface used in a piece of work, which may incorporate material and logos from dozens of different brands is beyond impractical. Especially when for the most part fonts "just work" for nearly all people, nearly all of the time unless they've got the no-embed bit set.
Since font shapes cannot be copyrighted, they will have a tough time proving that their own ttf file (which can be copyrighted) was used unlawfully. If universal claimed the font was not the font maker's font, I suppose they could demand to see the ttf file, and probably a judge would go along with it. And who's to say that universal couldn't have asked a third party to make the logo who had access to the font ttf file.
What crazy-ass font license does not allow derivative works?
I do some work that uses images in publications, not so much with fonts, but I expect that the license options are similar. Depending on the supplier, there can be all sorts of options. Internal use only. Public, but print-only, no Internet (then: how big is your print run?). Internet use, for a limited time. Internet use forever.
The most expensive license option is usually the one that covers products destined for resale. If it's not just a marketing expense, but something you intend to make a profit on, they want more money.
tl;dr: You absolutely must know how you intend to use something, so that you buy the appropriate license.
Enjoy life! This is not a dress rehearsal.
So now, the music labels will find a loophole that allows them to use other people's IP without permission or payment.
Then, inevitably, someone else will use this same strategy against them,
And that whole house of cards, built on a sandbar, could come tumbling down.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Wait, you're telling me Universal didn't read all 400 pages of the EULA before clicking 'okay' when using the font? It was clearly explained on P231.23.7. Doesn't matter, P435.1.2 explicitly surrendered their right to contest the matter.
Doesn't make the monetary demand any less absurd because it is not the RIAA/MPAA filing the suit. Used without proper licensing? Yes, give reasonable damages. Not 100X more than what it would cost to hire and buy a font outright from an experienced typographer.
While fonts themselves can be copyrighted, the typeface itself that is rendered by a font cannot be. So it is, in fact, entirely possible to create a lookalike font to a copyrighted font without infringing on the copyright on the latter as long as the lookalike font itself was not actually copied from the the copyrighted font.
In general (but not always), this means that the lookalike font was created from samples of text that use the original font, specifically text that only a utilizes a subset of the font, and a font designer would apply the patterns used in the characters within that sample to extrapolate the design of the remaining characters. Often, the end result can be virtually indistinguishable to almost anyone visually unless one knows exactly what to look for, and in exactly which glyphs. An excellent example of just how similar typefaces can be without infringing on copyright is to compare the typefaces Helvetica, Grotesque, and Arial.
In the case of something like a logo, the number of character samples can be often small enough that no differences will be detectable to the human eye at all.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I thought this was settled in U.S. copyright law. You can't copyright a font, only the computer instructions for making the font. Therefore, you can't restrict how text set in the font is distributed, only the usage of the font files by the designers.
If I can be modded down for being a troll, can I be modded up for being an orc, or a balrog?
Which is perfect, because if you buy something from Universal you need a different license to play it for an audience instead of just for yourself too. Sounds to me like Universal are in trouble for doing the exact same things that they criticize others for doing.
The major studios have been caught infringing on copyright many, many, many times before, but somehow they still think that it's ok for them, but not for anyone else.
I thought this was settled in U.S. copyright law. You can't copyright a font, only the computer instructions for making the font. Therefore, you can't restrict how text set in the font is distributed, only the usage of the font files by the designers.
You are correct, however as "software" it's licensed, and they can pretty do as they will there. There are plenty of software packages out there with separate non-commercial and commercial use licenses.
I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
They paid for a license but used it in the wrong way.
Exactly like buying a CD or DVD and selling copies of it or playing it in public. You bought a licence when you bought the DVD, but not the one you needed to do what you did with it.
Somehow? How many people at those major studios have had their lives ruined by massive lawsuits or given jail time for their actions?
None? Seems to be a pretty good precedent for thinking it doesn't apply to them.
I shouldn't need to tell you that we are talking about fonts and not movies.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
but I expect that the license options are similar.
Fonts are not, in of themselves, copyrightable. Only computer fonts can by protected with copyright, and that's only because technically they sort-of behave like code.
So it's not really like images, but computer code. While it is very common for computer code to have separate commercial and private licenses, I would think that this would not be common for fonts. Fonts can be freely cloned, so you would expect the market to toss out the nasty licenses. I mean, if I want a completely free license to a font I can't imagine it would cost more than a few hundred dollars on a freelance site to get a decent clone. That's why I was surprised.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
On using the software.
The designer maybe created it as a work for hire - they can't control what Universal does afterward. What Universal did with the generated image is governed by copyright law. I really think these font makers have some impossible terms in their license.
I'm sure it was already licensed for "commercial use" but font companies decide that there's something like "bigger commercial use" that this would have fallen under. Since Universal only used the generated images, I'm not sure how they're in any violation of the software license purchased by the designer.
This seems to me like a compelling argument for never licensing a commercial font, and just using the large and growing pool of free fonts.
Much as my personal policy for software is that if there is FOSS that can solve my problem, I try to use that even if there is something better that costs money. I don't even want to have to keep track of how many copies I have installed, how many backups I have made, etc.
That "Vamps" logo is pretty straightforward, and I'll bet it wouldn't be that hard to find some free font that would look about as nice.
Another good option: pay a free-lance artist (or even an art-college student) to design the logo, with a clear contract saying there will be no royalties.
As others have noted, the music labels are in the business of charging royalties and it's stupid for one to step on a licensing landmine like this.
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
Well to be fair, the statement was not factually incorrect, just completely misleading. Maybe naughtynaughty is the login of one DJT?
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Iirc, while a font (the .TTF file with the instructions for the computer on how to draw the font) can be copyrighted, a typeface (the visual representation of the font) cannot...
So unless they were including the TTF files as part of digital downloads, they may be in the clear?
https://torrentfreak.com/tvadd...
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Why shouldn't a font by copyrightable just like any form of image?
Ok so I looked it up and yes fonts are not copyrightable in the US which is different from how it works over here in Europe.
On using the software.
The designer maybe created it as a work for hire - they can't control what Universal does afterward. What Universal did with the generated image is governed by copyright law. I really think these font makers have some impossible terms in their license.
I'm sure it was already licensed for "commercial use" but font companies decide that there's something like "bigger commercial use" that this would have fallen under. Since Universal only used the generated images, I'm not sure how they're in any violation of the software license purchased by the designer.
It depends on the exact nature of their relationship with the designer. Without access to the contracts we have no way to know.
I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
Ha, yeah, I made sure I checked to see what country the case was filed in first :)
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
It is a font, of course it can be justified. It could also be aligned left, center or right.
Under US copyright law, the "strike" (image) of a font can not be copyrighted. Computer outline fonts can be copyrighted because the outlines are considered a computer program, even more so when there is hinting. Note that this copyright is on the specific outlines of a font. If you make a clone that looks the same, it will likely at least have fractionally different coordinates, and even the curves are likely to be subtly different.
On the other hand, font names are trademarked, so you can't just use the "usual" name of a font to sell a clone of it.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
They have no case. Fonts are not copyrightable. Only font files.
Instead of using people's tax dollars for courts, can't they just settle on a shared profit percentage??
Fonts, scents, colors, the rules to games, there's a whole list of stuff you can't copyright. The rules were probably laid down during the "British copyright don't apply in America" stage, early on, to screw over particular English vendors.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
it's not shit, it's coded instructions for a sleeper cell.
lucm, indeed.
and what specific kind it was doesn't matter.
If you are a lawyer, you are pretty terrible. Of course the type matters.
conflating typefaces with the pirated computer code which was used to create them in this case,
I'm not "conflating" anything. In the US, fonts are not subject to copyright. Only the fact that they are computer fonts with some aspects of computer code lets them have any protection at all. It is completely legal to make a clone of any font you want. This is nothing like a DVD movie, and so that comment deserves ridicule.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
This lawsuit is asking the courts to apply that case law to this situation and determine if it applies, how it applies, and necessary reparations if any.
I haven't read the full suit, but I expect it is more complex than the Slashdot summary.