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Letterhead Fonts controversy

Heated discussion on Typophile regarding the sales policy of Chuck Davis' Letterhead Fonts. The buyers receive an installer from Letterhead, which installs all the fonts bought in some folder that is not the usual folder for fonts. Many claim that they want direct access to the font files (for one thing, this is necessary if the user is on UNIX). Others go further and say that it is illegal to sell an OpenType font in another form (hidden and coded in the belly of an executable file) and still call it OpenType. Continued here: apparently, only outlines can be shipped with PDF or InDesign documents, not the fonts themselves. Complaints include: "this is suicide", font tweaking is impossible, backups are impossible, and "let them drown in their own persecution syndrome quagmire" (Hrant Papazian). On May 6, 2007, someone reported that one of their fonts was cracked, and mused that the pirates/hackers, once again, have a better product than the paying customers. Many months later, Letterhead reversed its policy.

A certain VBM wrote this on the thread in 2010: Chuck doesn't really make fonts anymore. He sells the fonts of better designers, and treats them like garbage. Just ask Larry White. As for that sham Fontguard, Chucky doesn't have much faith in it. He now places the purchaser's name and address in the Copyright/version string of the fonts you buy. And, he makes you register an account with a valid telephone number so he can call you and make sure that you're white. I registered to buy Factory earlier this year. Within about an hour he called me. The call went like this:
ME. Hello
Chuck.(Rudely) Yeah I'm calling to register an account for 'NAME', is that you?
ME. Yes, wow that was fast.
Chuck.(Rudely) Where are you from?
ME. I was born here in the US, why?
Chuck.(Rudely) No you're not, You don't sound American. You have a ghetto Accent.
ME. Well, my parents were from Asia, received citizenship in the 80's. But I was born here&I'm not ghetto.
Chuck. (Rudely)Forget it I can't help you. Go somewhere else. (Hung up)
Guy's a jerk. So if you have an accent or aren't within his color preference, I guess he won't sell to you. But sadly, that's really only hurting the designers who sell through him. Give it a try yourself. Let him call you and have a friend with a Russian or Hispanic accent answer. Watch him hang up. Before he sees this post that is. If only smart phones could record their audio...

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