You're right that DRM won't stop someone who really wants to steal a font. That's probably true even without opening up the EOT specification.
What it does, though, is make casual theft significantly harder, and that's what the foundries are really concerned about. There's quite a big difference between someone going out of their way to crack a font, and all and sundry being able to right-click and select download (oversimplifying slightly to make the point).
Subsetting needn't be an issue for dynamic sites, as it's optional. There are seven subsetting options in WEFT, the last of which is "No subsetting". Presumably any competing tool for WEFT could implement the same options.
I think I'd say that it's neglected technology, rather than poor, and proprietary "standards" (ahem) that have held back web font embedding. However, now that Microsoft have opened up EOT there's scope for open-source and competing implementations. Maybe even clunky old WEFT will get an upgrade!
I strongly disagree if you're saying that font embedding/licensing technology is restrictive. The whole concept of font embedding, which has been around since the early nineties, was quite forward-looking and liberal then and is still pretty fair now. Perhaps you're thinking of individual fonts that fail to license embedding, rather than the mechanism?
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2008-10-22 08:59 pm (UTC)You're right that DRM won't stop someone who really wants to steal a font. That's probably true even without opening up the EOT specification.
What it does, though, is make casual theft significantly harder, and that's what the foundries are really concerned about. There's quite a big difference between someone going out of their way to crack a font, and all and sundry being able to right-click and select download (oversimplifying slightly to make the point).
Subsetting needn't be an issue for dynamic sites, as it's optional. There are seven subsetting options in WEFT, the last of which is "No subsetting". Presumably any competing tool for WEFT could implement the same options.
I think I'd say that it's neglected technology, rather than poor, and proprietary "standards" (ahem) that have held back web font embedding. However, now that Microsoft have opened up EOT there's scope for open-source and competing implementations. Maybe even clunky old WEFT will get an upgrade!
I strongly disagree if you're saying that font embedding/licensing technology is restrictive. The whole concept of font embedding, which has been around since the early nineties, was quite forward-looking and liberal then and is still pretty fair now. Perhaps you're thinking of individual fonts that fail to license embedding, rather than the mechanism?