Yep.

I'll use Coda served from Adobe's Edge webfonts service as my example, from
https://edgewebfonts.adobe.com/fonts#/?nameFilter=coda&collection=coda

So from e.g. that page, i can obtain the Coda fonts by using the Developer 
tools of my web broswer. Not sure if this works for all browsers, but i'm using 
Chrome so it does…

The page's  Resources are exposed in the Developer tools and i can see the url 
of the Coda Regular font, it is;
data:font/opentype;base64,<i've cut the sqillions of lines of base64 encodingt>

That link kicks Chrome into downloading a single file called 'download' to my 
local machine.
I then add the file extension '.woff' to that file, to create 'download.woff'. 
It's a base64 encoded woff font file.

I can then use this font file, or… i guess i can use it?… can i share it? What 
should i call it? can i use it on my own server within a css @font-face rule?
I would like to print with it too… but it's a WOFF file, so more practical if i 
convert it… can i convert it into an opentype (OTF) file format? and print with 
it? Can i share that OTF? What can i call it?

I can understand why the situation is like this; Adobe only really want users 
of their service to use Coda as a 'webfont', they don't want to distribute it 
as e.g. an OTF font that can be used for printing, or as a TTF that can be used 
to build a @font-face kit. There is clearly NO WAY they are going to inform 
users to grab the font in the way i have, because then users will likely grab 
all the proprietary font in the same way. Remember the Adobe Typekit 
distribution system is designed to hinder and kerb the free distribution of 
proprietary font files. Libre fonts have just been slotted into the same system.

So… assuming as a user i have the resources and knowledge … i can use software 
to look at the metadata of the woff file. I'll use FontForge. Copyright is me 
:) RFN's are stated etc etc. But no mention of OFL, instead the license string 
is http://typekit.com/eulas/********  This takes me to the 'EULA' for Coda, and 
there is the OFL for Coda.

How could this situation be improved? Adobe could also allow the fonts to be 
downloaded as OTFs or TTFs. I doubt that will happen, and it's not my place to 
think it should.

As i've said in earlier posts, i think the solution lies more in the hands of 
font designers, to distribute font files that can carry enough standalone info 
to make them independent from other sources of usage & licensing info as 
possible. I should not rely on re-distributors to get all the font info in 
order, it should be in the font object itself. This would do 2 things; (1) Give 
enough information to make it clear that it's Free Software, (2) If that info 
is removed, then the remover has removed the most crucial flag to denoting the 
Free-ness of the font, which would be clearly naughty. 

-vernon

On 5 Jun 2013, at 12:38, Dave Crossland <d...@lab6.com> wrote:

> On 5 June 2013 15:23, Vernon Adams <v...@newtypography.co.uk> wrote:
>> i feel that the file coming to users from Typekit etc could be a bit more 
>> 'informational'.
> 
> Can you be more concrete and specific?

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