[Lohit-devel-list] Relicensing Lohit fonts

[Shriramana Sharma]

Good show. I have also been uncomfortable with the GPL for fonts. The
OFL is far better and will facilitate my contribution to the project
in future.

On 9/13/11, Richard Fontana <rfontana at redhat.com> wrote:
> Hello,
>
> For those who don't know me, I'm a lawyer at Red Hat responsible for
> licensing issues.
>
> The Lohit fonts were originally supplied to Red Hat by Modular
> Infotech, under an agreement under which Red Hat could license out the
> fonts under GPL plus the FSF's font-embedding exception.
>
> Since that time, within the Fedora Project and Red Hat we have
> generally moved towards favoring a different open license for fonts,
> called the SIL Open Font License 1.1 (the "OFL").
> http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?item_id=OFL_web
> See http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Legal_considerations_for_fonts
> (noting Fedora's recommendation of the OFL for fonts).
>
> We have also found that, while a GPL-based license for fonts has some
> theoretical benefits, it is perceived by many as confusing to map the
> GPL to fonts, and we believe the perceived burdens of GPL licensing of
> fonts may be limiting adoption of the fonts at least to some
> degree. We anticipate that use of the OFL would broaden the user and
> contributor base for these fonts.
>
> Google in particular has for some time been interested in using the
> Lohit fonts, including all the improvements made by this project, in
> ChromeOS and (I believe) Android, but finds a GPL-based font license
> unacceptable. Google is willing to accept fonts under the OFL,
> however.
>
> Red Hat has recently amended our agreement with the supplier to allow
> us to retroactively license all the Lohit fonts under the OFL. Thus,
> all subsequent improvements made to the original fonts by the Lohit
> fonts project can also be licensed under the OFL.
>
> Under the circumstances specific to this project, I believe we can
> relicense to OFL subject to any objection by any past contributor to
> the fonts. If there is no objection, we will proceed with relicensing
> under OFL in due course.
>
> Thank you,
>
> Richard Fontana
> Open Source Licensing and Patent Counsel
> Red Hat, Inc.
>
>
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>


-- 
Shriramana Sharma