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Title: You need to copy to understand
Date: 2006-08-06 15:43
Author: Femke
Category: Conversations, Type
Tags: Culture of work, Piracy, Type
Slug: you-need-to-copy-to-understand
Status: published
*Interview with Harrisson*
One of the co-conspirators in this open source adventure is a Brussels
*graphiste* going under the name **Harrisson**. His interest in open
source software flows with the culture of exchange that keeps the off
centre music scene alive, as well as with the humanist tradition
persistingly present in contemporary typography.
Harrissons' visual frame of reference is eclectic and vibrant, including
modernist giants, vernacular design, local typographic culture, classic
painting, drawing and graffiti. Too much food for one conversation.
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*You could say that "A typeface is entirely derivative", but others
argue, that maybe the alphabet is, but not the interpretations of it.*
The main point of typography and ownership today is that there is a
blurred border between language and letters. So: now you can own the
'shape' of a letter. Traditionally, the way typographers made a living
was by buying (more or less expensive) lead fonts, and with this tool
they printed books and got paid for that. They got paid for the
typesetting, not for the type. That was the work of the foundries.
Today, thanks to the digital tools, you can easily switch between type
design, type setting and graphic design.
*What about the idea that fonts might be the most 'pirated' digital
object possible? Copying is much more difficult when you've got lead
type to handle!
*
Yes, digitalisation changed the rules. Just as mp3 changed the
philosophy of music. But in typography, there is a strange confrontation
between this flux of copied information, piracy and old rules of
ownership from the past.
*Do you think the culture of sharing fonts changed? Or: the culture of
distributing them? If you look at most licenses for fonts, they are
extremely restrictive. Even 99% of Free Fonts do not allow derivative
works.*
[{width="300"
height="183"}](http://ospublish.constantvzw.org/blog/wp-content/font_message2.jpg)
<small>Warning message when attempting to embed a font in
InDesign</small>
The public good culture is paradoxally not often there. Or at least the
economical model of living with public good idea is not very developed.
While I think typography, historically, is always seen as a way to share
knowledge. Humanist stuff.
> The art and craft of typeface design is currently headed for
> extinction due to the illegal proliferation of font software, piracy,
> and general disregard for proper licensing etiquette.
>
> <small><http://redesign.emigre.com/FAQ.php></small>
Emigré... Did they not live from the copyrights of fonts?!
*You are right. They are like a commercial record company. Can you
imagine what would happen if you would open up the typographic trade -
to 'open source' this economy? Stop chasing piracy and allow users to
embed, study, copy, modify and redistribute typefaces?
*
Well we are not that far from this in fact. Every designer has at least
500 fonts on their computer, not licenced, but copied because it would
be impossible to pay for!
*Even the distribution model of fonts is very peer-to-peer as well. The
reality might come close, but font licenses tell a different story.*
> I believe that we live in an era where anything that can be expressed
> as bits will be. I believe that bits exist to be copied. Therefore, I
> believe that any business-model that depends on your bits not being
> copied is just dumb, and that lawmakers who try to prop these up are
> like governments that sink fortunes into protecting people who insist
> on living on the sides of active volcanoes.
>
> <small>Cory Doctorow in <http://craphound.com/bio.php></small>
*I am not saying all fonts should be open, but it is just that it would
be interesting when type designers were testing and experimenting with
other ways of developing and distributing type, with another economy.*
Yes, but fonts have a much more reduced user community than music or
bookpublishing, so old rules stay.
*Is that it? I am surprised to see that almost all typographers and
foundries take the 'piracy is a crime' side on this issue. While
typographers are early and enthusiastic adapters of computer technology,
they have not taken much from the collaborative culture that came with
it.*
This is the 'tradition' typography inherited. Typography was one of the
first laboratories for fractioning work for efficiency. It was one of
the first modern industries, and has developed a really deep culture
where it is not easy to set doubts in. 500 years of tradition and only
20 years of computers.The complexity comes from the fact it is
influenced by a multiple series of elements, from history and tradition
to the latest technologies. But it is always related to an economic
production system, so property and 'secrets-of-the-trade' have a big
influence on it.
*I think it is important to remember how the current culture of (not)
sharing fonts is linked to its history. But books have been made for
quite a while too.*
Open source systems may be not so much influencing distribution,
licenses and economic models in typography, but can set original
questions to this problematic of digital type. Old tools and histories
are not reliable anymore.
*Yes. with networked software it is rather obvious that it is useful to
work together. I try to understand how this works with respect to making
a font. Would that work?
*
Collaborative type is extremely important now, I think. The
globalisation of computer systems sets the language of typography in a
new dimension. We use computers in Belgium and in China. Same hardware.
But language is the problem! A French typographer might not be the best
person to define a Vietnamese font. Collaborativity is necessary!
[Pierre Huyghebaert](http://www.speculoos.com)told me he once designed
an Arabic font when he was in Lebanon. For him, the font was legible,
but nobody there was able to read it.
*But how would you collaborate than? I mean... what would be the reason
for a French typographer to collaborate with one from China? What would
that bring? I'm imagining some kind of hybrid result... kind of
interesting.*
Again, sharing. We all have the idea that English is the modern Latin,
and if we are not careful the future of computers will result in a
language reductionism.
*What interest me in open source, is the potential for 'biodiversity'.*
I partially agree, and the open source idea contradicts the reductionist
approach by giving more importance to local knowledge. A collaboration
between an Arabic typographer and a French one can be to work on tools
that allow both languages to co-exist. Latex permits that, for example.
Not QuarkXpress!
*Where does your interest in typography actually come from?*
I think I first looked at comic books, and then started doodling in the
margins of schoolbooks. As a teenager, I used to reproduce film titles
such as Aliens, Terminator or other sci-fi high-octane typographic
titles.
[{width="300"
height="31"}](http://ospublish.constantvzw.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/terminator.jpg)
Basically, I'm a forger! In writing, you need to copy to understand.
Thats an old necessity.
If you use a typeface, you express something. You're putting drawings of
letters next to each other to compose a word/text. A drawing is always
emotionally charged, which gives color (or taste) to the message. You
need to know what's inside a font to know what it expresses.
*How do you find out what's inside?*
By reproducing letters, and using them. A Gill Sans does not have the
same emotional load as a Bodoni. To understand a font is complicated,
because it refers to almost every field in culture. The banners behind
G.W. Bush communicate more than just 'Mission Accomplished'. Typefaces
carry a 'meta language'.
[{width="300"
height="88"}](http://ospublish.constantvzw.org/blog/wp-content/compassion_bush.jpg)
<small>http://voice.aiga.org/content.cfm?ContentAlias=%5Fgetfullarticle&aid=2131398</small>
*It is truly embedded content*
Exactly!
It is still very difficult to bridge the gap between personal emotions
and programming a font. Moreover, there are different approaches, from
stroke design to software that generates fonts. And typography is
standardisation.
The first digital fonts are drawn fixed shapes, letter by letter,
'outstrokes'. But there is another approach where the letters are traced
by the computer. It needs software to be generated. In Autocad, letters
are 'innerstroke' that can vary of weight. Letterrors' Beowolf is also
an example of that kind of approach.
{width="260"
height="75"}
<small><http://www.letterror.com/foundry/beowolf/></small>
It's a very interesting way to work, but the font depends on the
platform it goes with. Beowolf only works on OS9. It also set the
question of copyright very far. It's a case study in itself.
*So it means, the font is software in fact?*
Yes, but the inter-dependance between font and operating systems is very
strong, contrary to a fixed format such as TrueType. For printed matter,
this is much more complicated to achieve. There are in-between formats,
such as Multiple Master Technology for example. It basically means, that
you have 2 shapes for 1 glyph, and you can set an 'alternative' shape
between the 2 shapes. At Adobe they still do not understand why it was
(and still is) a failure...
[{width="250"
height="198"}](http://ospublish.constantvzw.org/blog/wp-content/MM.jpg)
*I really like this idea... to have more than one master. Imagine you
own one master and I own the other and than we adjust and tweak from
different sides. That would be real collaborative type! Could 'multiple'
mean more than one you think?
*
It is a bit more complicated than drawing a simple font in Fontographer
or Fontforge. Pierre told me that MM feature is still available in Adobe
Illustrator, but that it is used very seldomly. Multiple Master fonts
are also a bit complicated to use. I think there were a lot of bugs
first, and then you need to be a skilled designer to give these fonts a
nice render. I never heard of an alternative use of it, with drawing or
so. In the end it was probably never a success because of the software
dependency.
*While I always thought of fonts as extremely cross media. Do you
remember which classic font was basically the average between many
well-known fonts? Frutiger?*
Fonts are Culture Capsules! It was Adrian Frutiger. But he wasn't the
only one to try... It was a research for the Univers font I think. Here
again we meet this paradox of typography: a standardisation of language
generating cultural complexity.
[{width="144"
height="150"}](http://ospublish.constantvzw.org/blog/wp-content/A.jpg)
<small>Sketch for Univers by Adrian Frutiger</small>
*Univers. That makes sense. Amazing to see those examples together. It
seems digital typography got stuck at some point, and I think some of
the ideas and practices that are current in open source could help break
out of it.*
Yes of course. And it is almost virgin space.
*In 2003 the Danish government released Union, a font that could be
freely used for publications concerning Danish culture. I find this an
intrigueing idea, that a font could be seen as some kind of 'public
good'.*
[{width="300"
height="89"}](http://ospublish.constantvzw.org/blog/wp-content/union.png)
<small>http://www.identifont.com/show?BW8</small>
I am convinced that knowledge needs to be open... (speaking as the son
of a teacher here!). One medium for knowledge is language and its atoms
are letters.
*But if information wants to be free, does that mean that design needs
to be free too? Is there information possible without design?*
This is why I like books. Because it's a mix between information and
beauty - or can be. Pfff, there is nothing without design... It is like
is there something without language, no?