Re: Does Acrobat 6 have font Fonts Rights Management limitations that previous versions of Acrobat did n
It would not be improper to embed fonts that are licensed for editable embedding in my view. While one could I suppose construct an argument that the right to embed for editable embedding is a right assigned only to the font licensee (which is what a claimed restriction on the meaning of embedding "editable embedding allowed" fonts implies) it makes no sense that this was the historical import of the editable embed permission in a font license, since by definition the font licensee has the right to use the font to begin with.
But of course one could argue that there is a precedent here, in that a font is licensed to be on the PC for printing purposes with another permission included for "download" to a printer. If one follows such thinking then a font that is licensed for editable embedding might imply that only the licensee may embed for his or her own use so-licensed fonts for embedded licensing use, and that no right to use such an editably-embedded font extends to non-licensees. I don't personally feel that this is what was what the term "editable embedding" meant originally, however, as it implies a worthless right. When would anyone need to embed a font they already own a license to if they just want to edit in place on the same PC?
Therefore the term implied a distributione and end use right. But of course thus is a question for copyright lawyers if applied in practice. Can we or can't we? Only our lawyers can answer that with respect to each application.
Apart from this quibble, it would certainly be an overstep to restrict the editable embedding of a font that was originally licensed for installable embedding, as some, though very few, fonts are.
I think there is a need for a comprehensive consumer guide to fonts that remain useable at all in practice considering the narrowing applicability of PDF in this context. If there are limitations in Acrobat, it would be nice to see these spelled out in detail so as to avoid the time and bother of figuring out each limitation.
Getting back to the font limitations, it would really help if there were also a cross-vendor master list of fonts that could be given to clients or end users so that they know which fonts can travel where and how. Documents could then be purpose-built so that the workflow is not impeded when a rights-management snag is encountered.
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Date: Sat, 24 Apr 2004 10:25:59 -0700