Re: Tom Phinney on Libre Fonts

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Newsgroups gmane.comp.fonts.fontforge.devel,gmane.comp.fonts.fontforge.user,gmane.comp.freedesktop.fonts
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Article mighty short on empirical examples. Or maybe just a list of what 
makes, in the eyes of TP, a "quality" font?
 
Writing as a guy who "cracks open" a lot of fonts - both those offered 
as licensed 'for-pay' products and also open-source and also dafont 
anything goes fonts....
I see questionable work in "for-pay" fonts, and good work in free beer 
fonts, it all depends.
 
My beef is that we still seem to be talking about fonts as tools for the 
graphic arts. When it comes to fonts for the web, what is being offered is 
still a joke. (Yes, there are always exceptions - don't pounce.)
 
Bottom line this: Quality is not what the maker puts in, it's what the 
buyer/user gets out. The maker does not define what constitutes quality.
(Most importantly, do NOT equate the need for time-consuming fussiness with 
"quality". A lot of fuss is indicative of nothing except an inefficient 
manufacturing system.) 
 
This notion is certainly not original to me. (Read Peter Drucker on the 
subject, or Edward Deming - the father of modern Statistical Quality 
Control in manufacturing.)
 
But, of course, when you fancy yourselves as the standard-bearers of high 
culture as many in the type field seem to do, it's hard to accept the idea 
that they truly are not able to recognize "quality".
It's the great unwashed (and unschooled) users who ultimately define what 
"quality" is or isn't.
 
Personally, I couldn't give a crap how far away from my lower case o my 
capital T is in the word "To".  To me, that isn't quality. But if I do want 
to adjust kerning, I'll use lettering.js.
 
rich 
 
 
 
 

On Sunday, October 13, 2013 4:10:51 AM UTC-4, Dave Crossland wrote:

> Hi! 
>
> Fun article on libre fonts from ATypI: 
>
> http://www.thomasphinney.com/2013/10/free-fonts-revealed-and-reviled/ 
>
> -- 
> Cheers 
> Dave 
>

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