The font issue: Is your company playing by the rules?

Learn about font licensing agreements from someone who actually reads the fine print

What is a font?

⚖️ Commercial versus personal use

🔮 Beware of “free” fonts

💰 What are the costs?

What is an End-User Licence Agreement (EULA)?

🤝 What types of licenses are there?

🤔 What is a live font and how is it different from a rasterized or outlined font?

  1. This is a live font. You can highlight and copy/paste this text.
See the difference between the above two examples? You can copy and paste the text from the first example, but you can’t do it with the second example because it’s a PNG image file. You can only copy/paste the actual PNG.

✋ Common restrictions and limitations

  1. The number of people who may use the licensed fonts, or the number of computers the licensed fonts may be installed on is usually limited. You have to pay for extra “seat” licenses if you want to install the fonts on additional computers, and you may have to get a new license all together if you want to send the fonts to another organization.
  2. You may be limited to a maximum number of printed materials or online impressions (i.e., page views on a website) using a font. If there’s a limit, you’ll have to upgrade your license and pay additional fees to go beyond.

🙏 Google Fonts: a saving grace

Conclusion

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Principal & Creative Director @breakenterto

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