B&H Fonts and XFree86

[Rod Dixon, J.D., LL.M.]

You have asked some very tough questions. The notice you quoted appears to
be a poorly drafted, but perhaps it is out of context. I am not sure why
someone would use a trademark license like the one contained here. (It does
not appear to be a certification mark). The problem with this font/typeface
is that it MAY be subject to copyright protection outside of the U.S., but I
do not believe that this font is subject to copyright in the U.S. Of course,
this may pose serious concern if you are trying to distribute the font (in
digital form) on the Internet.

Printouts are typefaces rather than fonts (I think) so U.S. distribution
should not pose a copyright issue. To answer your question, I think use of
the font/typeface is fine in the U.S.

Rod

> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Johnson [mailto:david at usermode.org]
> Sent: Tuesday, August 08, 2000 10:49 PM
> To: license-discuss at opensource.org
> Subject: B&H Fonts and XFree86
>
>
> I got pulled into a discussion on a non-software mailing list regarding
> fonts. It was claimed that redistributing the Lucida fonts was illegal.
> This surprised me since these are included with XFree86, which I still
> consider to be freely redistributable. The dispute involved trying to
> acquire these fonts in order to reproduce the style of a certain
> publisher.
>
> Copying part of the legal notice that comes with the XFree86 source
> regarding the Lucida fonts from Bigelow and Holmes:
>
> 	NOTICE TO USER: The source code, including the glyphs or icons
> 	forming a par of the OPEN LOOK TM Graphic User Interface, on this
> 	tape and in these files is copyrighted under U.S. and international
> 	laws. Sun Microsystems, Inc. of Mountain View, California owns
> 	the copyright and has design patents pending on many of the icons.
> 	AT&T is the owner of the OPEN LOOK trademark associated with the
> 	materials on this tape. Users and possessors of this source code
> 	are hereby granted a nonexclusive, royalty-free copyright and
> 	design patent license to use this code in individual and
> 	commercial software. A royalty-free, nonexclusive trademark
> 	license to refer to the code and output as "OPEN LOOK" compatible
> 	is available from AT&T if, and only if, the appearance of the
> 	icons or glyphs is not changed in any manner except as absolutely
> 	necessary to accommodate the standard resolution of the screen or
> 	other output device, the code and output is not changed except as
> 	authorized herein, and the code and output is validated by AT&T.
> 	Bigelow & Holmes is the owner of the Lucida (R) trademark for the
> 	fonts and bit-mapped images associated with the materials on this
> 	tape. Users are granted a royalty-free, nonexclusive license to use
> 	the trademark only to identify the fonts and bit-mapped images if,
> 	and only if, the fonts and bit-mapped images are not modified in any
> 	way by the user.
>
> Questions: Is it permissable to redistribute the Lucida fonts? Is an
> electronic document considered software? Is it permissable to
> distribute printouts using these fonts?
>
> Thanks,
>
>  --
> David Johnson
> _________________________
> <http://www.usermode.org>
>