Article 103524 of comp.fonts:
From: "Apostrophe \('\)" < apostrofe@mail.com >
Date: April 6, 2000
Newsgroups: comp.fonts


Take it easy on worshipping foundries. It can only provoke headaches. Every
foundry burns out after a while. In this case, Adobe Type has not released
anything of value since March of 1999 (boutique foundries with Starbucks
ways of packaging seem to have more enthusiasm these days). Besides, they're
still selling multiple masters, even though they already announced that they
already have no plans to support or build on the technology in the future.
Adobe is just a ghost of its old self now. Stone and Twombly are not there
anymore, and their public representative is dodging bullets back and fourth
from people who know more about Adobe's secrets than he does. Not much
manpower left there to keep the horse running either. Adobe Type is nothing
more than Slimbach, a few technicians, and a whole troop of business people.

Big distributors are being cursed by every designer out there now. And who
can blame them? Adobe burned out, ITC and Monotype sold out, Berthold is a
squeeze, Scangraphics is not around anymore, Precision Type are knocking
themselves off to impress people who are not buying anyhow, Linotype have
become a collector haven with no more common sense about marketing than they
originally had (they actually SELL their sample catalogue for $26), Fontshop
also keep knocking themselves off as well as selling the young's
shareware-like fonts. And the more snot-nosed places are being chastisized
as well: Enschede keeps putting sample scan on their web site, but no fonts
are ever released, Dutch Type, same deal, Emigre, not even 10% of type
output compared to just two years back. And designers wonder what the hell
happened? Royalties are not enough, marketing is not efficient, and waah
waah people are not buying my fonts anymore. Well here's what happened:
industry. Bitstream happened, software-bundles happened, and a bunch of
business people started selling CDs. When you buy the Bitstream CD for $50,
or even their brand new CD for $1700, you basically have all that you need
to design under proper license for years to come. And that's it! Fonts have
become less of a practical accessory to design, and more of a luxury,
something that people on a budget would not pay for. And I'm afraid there's
no way out of this one. This is the way private enterprise works, and it's
damn good in certain respects, but for some reason it's rearing its ugly
head in the type industry. Most of it has something to do with the legal
structure and the way we have people who make a living out of exploiting it.
Under bankrupcy laws, Bitstream got away with selling 500 fonts for $50
without having to pay royalties to designers. Not a pretty statement about legal
systems. Berthold intimidated Primafonts out of their legally purchased
rights. Also not a pretty statement. And who is the victim of all this? Of
course, the designer. The royalties are still low, the marketing is still
inefficient, and people are not buying fonts anymore. What's the way out.

I took the time to type out all this, just to let you know, Dennis, that
everything about type ethics has been rehashed back and fourth, and we're
all reluctant to admit that the type industry, to use a cliché, is going to
hell in a handbasket, and there is mostly nothing anyone can do about it. In
the case of Cronos, in defense of Adobe (though I'm not their greatest fan),
they sure did rip off Kuester, but Cronos' selling feature at the time was
its multiple master design and how it could be used in ways that Today Sans
could not. All ethics aside, and from a strict business point, the question
that mattered was: how could I appeal to a designer enough to purchase my
product? And multiple masters was one of the answers. Now, of course, they
can ask themselves that same question, but they won't be able to answer it
without exercising some unethical action.

Alright, rant is over. Now you can sit there and brood, just like I do,
about Adobe killing the multiple master technology.

'