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From: batcheldern@hannah.enet.dec.com (Ned Batchelder)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.postscript
Subject: Re: Copyright of Coded Font Programs
Message-ID: <8021@shlump.nac.dec.com>
Date: 1 Feb 90 19:39:17 GMT
References: <1701@adobe.UUCP>
Sender: newsdaemon@shlump.nac.dec.com
Reply-To: batcheldern@hannah.enet.dec.com
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation
Lines: 24

> I'm not a lawyer, but this information may help clear this up a bit:

> 
> - Fonts CAN BE trademarked.  In fact Linotype and ITC own the trademarks for
>   many of the fonts that Adobe has converted to Type 1 format and marketed.  
>   Adobe licenses these from the trademark holders, so the comment that 
>   typeface designers are not being protected (while Adobe and digital type
>   foundries are) is incorrect.

Wrong. Fonts CANNOT be trademarked. Font NAMES can be trademarked.
Linotype and ITC, and all the others own trademarks on the names of
their fonts, which protects them from competitors selling fonts under
the same name. That's the reason you see Helvetica look-alikes called
Swiss. The design is probably very faithful (to use a positive word) to
the original Helvetica, but they aren't allowed to call it Helvetica,
because Helvetica is a registered trademark of Allied Corporation.

Perhaps the confusion comes from the punctuation commonly used. It
should be written as 

	"Helvetica" is a registered trademark of Allied Corporation


Ned Batchelder, Digital Equipment Corp., BatchelderN@Hannah.enet.DEC.com