Bug#1135180: Bug#902981: DFSG status of fonts-font-awesome (was: Re: Bug#902981: new upstream (5.1.0))

> On May 19, 2026, at 12:44 AM, Julian Gilbey <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> Hey Rob,
> 
> Thank you *so* much for this information.  That's really helpful.
> 
> I don't know where that puts us now.  Can we say that FontAwesome of
> any version is DFSG-free, given that the original sources are not
> available for any version of the font?  How do we move forward?
> debian-legal - your input here would be most welcome.  And Rob - if
> you are able to give any advice here, that would also be welcome.  

Hey Julian,

I don’t have any silver bullets. But I’m here to answer questions and see if we can figure something out. I’d hate to have Font Awesome removed just because you all didn’t have the complete picture.

I understand the legal tension here but we use Debian all over the place at FA. If I can assist in finding a solution it’s a small way for us to say thank you.

I do think the hinge is on legal here. I can’t make the build system or the source files available because we are a for-profit commercial company. If that’s a deal-breaker I respect that. But I do wonder if there’s some middle ground or exception? If it can’t have minified files I can produce an artifact that doesn’t contain this. If there has to be an uncompressed OTF part of the package I can do that. I’m willing to work within some requirements and even take some ownership of the package maintenance.

Let me ask this: are there any other products like FA where there is a commercial entity and where the “source code” (I’m using this term loosely) is available for a free version of it? Has Debian solved this for another org and we can use prior art? 

> We
> *do* want to keep FontAwesome around - it is so amazing (awesome?!)
> and so ubiquitous!

Yes, I really don’t want users of Debian or FA to suffer here. That’s what compelled me to speak up on this VERY old bug. :)

> 
> Best wishes,
> 
>   Julian