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Rip-off? You tell me.
- Thread starter Steve C.
- Start date
Jim Doggett
New Member
"How much do you have to change a design so that "inspiration" is not copying?.... "
0% Type (our alphabet) is in the public domain. Trademarked names such as Helvetica are not. Just call it something else, but you have to recreate it from scratch and not copy the orginal art.
0% Type (our alphabet) is in the public domain. Trademarked names such as Helvetica are not. Just call it something else, but you have to recreate it from scratch and not copy the orginal art.
Steve I agree with everyone else on everything. The fonts are well over 90% identical and I definitely think you should get a lawyer. Ill suggest something for the lawyer thing. When hiring a lawyer, it gets expensive very fast. I am at a stage where I can not really afford to do so. So what I have found works well instead. I call different law firms and a lot of times you can learn a lot of knowledge about your issues over the phone FOR FREE! It works well for obtaining knowledge and then you could always represent your self depending on what level of court the case reaches.
Replicator
New Member
Email sent to you Steve . . . !
omgsideburns
New Member
CES020
New Member
Or something to consider, start a new, fresh post and name it to the fact you were ripped off by ____________. Use his name, his work names, and everything else that links to him. Show examples as well as his response that he wasn't going to remove it.
What will happen is that this forum carries so much weight with search engines, when people are really looking for him, your post might very well end up ahead of his own site, and the description line of text would say he's a thief and stole from you.
You'd probably get some action then, when his potential clients are seeing how he treats people's work when they are searching for him.
Don't get mad, get even
What will happen is that this forum carries so much weight with search engines, when people are really looking for him, your post might very well end up ahead of his own site, and the description line of text would say he's a thief and stole from you.
You'd probably get some action then, when his potential clients are seeing how he treats people's work when they are searching for him.
Don't get mad, get even
cptcorn
adad
Or something to consider, start a new, fresh post and name it to the fact you were ripped off by ____________. Use his name, his work names, and everything else that links to him. Show examples as well as his response that he wasn't going to remove it.
What will happen is that this forum carries so much weight with search engines, when people are really looking for him, your post might very well end up ahead of his own site, and the description line of text would say he's a thief and stole from you.
You'd probably get some action then, when his potential clients are seeing how he treats people's work when they are searching for him.
Don't get mad, get even
You might then get charged with hearsay or defamation of character... I'm no lawyer though.
I can't find any glyphs that are exactly the same. He's done a great job of
altering it just enough.
Rister was one of my first fonts and was totally created using Corel 4 only.
Scaling is at 2048 UPM and his is at 1000 UPM, so that makes it hard to
match them up anyway. I don't see that it is worth pursuing. Thanks for all
the help and offers to help anyway. You all are great!
altering it just enough.
Rister was one of my first fonts and was totally created using Corel 4 only.
Scaling is at 2048 UPM and his is at 1000 UPM, so that makes it hard to
match them up anyway. I don't see that it is worth pursuing. Thanks for all
the help and offers to help anyway. You all are great!
Attachments
The Vector Doctor
Chief Bezier Manipulator
I found this, it is unfortunate for font designers... Last paragraph is interesting
"Within the last few years, the situation has changed dramatically. Two specific legal cases have shown that fonts are protected from unauthorized duplication because they are computer software. Note carefully that this applies only to the font software itself (the PostScript or TrueType file), not the actual artistic design.
From 1993 to 1995, Bitstream and four other type companies successfully sued SWFTE for copyright infringement. SWFTE had used computer programs to take other typefounders' fonts, convert them to their own format and give them new names. The case centered around the fact that SWFTE had used Bitstream's software (the digital fonts themselves) to create the new fonts. This was, however, a singular case and was somewhat controversial, so it did not conclusively settle the font copyright issue.
Three years later an even stronger legal precedent was set in the case of Adobe vs. Southern Software Inc. (SSI). It seems that SSI had used FontMonger to copy and rename fonts from Adobe and others. They thought they were safe from prosecution because, though they had directly copied the points that define the shapes from Adobe's fonts, they had moved all the points just slightly so they were not technically identical. Nevertheless, in his 1998 judgment, the judge determined that the computer code had been copied:
The evidence presented shows that there is some creativity in designing the font software programs. While the glyph dictates to a certain extent what points the editor must choose, it does not dictate every point that must be chosen. Adobe has shown that font editors make creative choices as to what points to select based on the image in front of them on the computer screen. The code is determined directly from the selection of the points. Thus, any copying of the points is copying of literal expression, that is, in essence, copying of the computer code itself.
As a result of this judgment, companies must be much more diligent about the font design process. If they develop a font that is very similar to an existing font they must be quite careful that all the design work is original: that every glyph is redrawn and that other software information (such as width metrics) is not based upon the original software 'code' of the font.
Unlike before 1998, it can now be argued that opening up a commercial font in a font design program (such as FontLab), copying the outline to the template or mask layer and redrawing the letter to match the shape of the original is a breach of copyright law. This is true even if every point is new, because the original software code was viewed in FontLab and used as a template for the new work. This is clearly a very strong, new interpretation of the copyright law.
If a type designer wants to 'copy' a font in a manner legal in the USA, he would now be required to print out every glyph at large size on a printer, then scan the image and import it into the font design program. He could then manually or automatically trace the image. This seems to be perfectly legal under current understandings of US copyright law, but may not be morally acceptable."
"Within the last few years, the situation has changed dramatically. Two specific legal cases have shown that fonts are protected from unauthorized duplication because they are computer software. Note carefully that this applies only to the font software itself (the PostScript or TrueType file), not the actual artistic design.
From 1993 to 1995, Bitstream and four other type companies successfully sued SWFTE for copyright infringement. SWFTE had used computer programs to take other typefounders' fonts, convert them to their own format and give them new names. The case centered around the fact that SWFTE had used Bitstream's software (the digital fonts themselves) to create the new fonts. This was, however, a singular case and was somewhat controversial, so it did not conclusively settle the font copyright issue.
Three years later an even stronger legal precedent was set in the case of Adobe vs. Southern Software Inc. (SSI). It seems that SSI had used FontMonger to copy and rename fonts from Adobe and others. They thought they were safe from prosecution because, though they had directly copied the points that define the shapes from Adobe's fonts, they had moved all the points just slightly so they were not technically identical. Nevertheless, in his 1998 judgment, the judge determined that the computer code had been copied:
The evidence presented shows that there is some creativity in designing the font software programs. While the glyph dictates to a certain extent what points the editor must choose, it does not dictate every point that must be chosen. Adobe has shown that font editors make creative choices as to what points to select based on the image in front of them on the computer screen. The code is determined directly from the selection of the points. Thus, any copying of the points is copying of literal expression, that is, in essence, copying of the computer code itself.
As a result of this judgment, companies must be much more diligent about the font design process. If they develop a font that is very similar to an existing font they must be quite careful that all the design work is original: that every glyph is redrawn and that other software information (such as width metrics) is not based upon the original software 'code' of the font.
Unlike before 1998, it can now be argued that opening up a commercial font in a font design program (such as FontLab), copying the outline to the template or mask layer and redrawing the letter to match the shape of the original is a breach of copyright law. This is true even if every point is new, because the original software code was viewed in FontLab and used as a template for the new work. This is clearly a very strong, new interpretation of the copyright law.
If a type designer wants to 'copy' a font in a manner legal in the USA, he would now be required to print out every glyph at large size on a printer, then scan the image and import it into the font design program. He could then manually or automatically trace the image. This seems to be perfectly legal under current understandings of US copyright law, but may not be morally acceptable."
HaroldDesign
New Member
You should still let him know he's an a-hole, and his fingers should be chopped off and put in alphabet soup that he has to eat.
Rodi
New Member
The characters of fonts are not protected under US copyright, only the names, that is why Bitstream has Swiss and Lino has Helvetica etc etc. That said however, if it can be proved that someone just took a font and renamed it. It gets sketchy at times, check out softmaker.com and their fonts. At first blush they seem ripe for as a rip off, but then it becomes apparent that they have some clones some really licensed fonts and some right in the middle.
Steve you have an End Users License Agreement that goes with your fonts? That goes a long way in courts. What can be helpful too is that once you buy your font from this scumbag, you can show that it was originated within x weeks of his purchase of your font. That is good.
Fonts are a beauty and a bitch business and there is so much to be made on them, espeically in the long run…