Years ago I posted a small family of fonts on DaFont. It had minimal character set and was not quite polished. I didn't include a EULA with it, and I tagged it 100% Free. (Not the wisest thing to do.) In the meantime I completed the character set, redesigned some glyphs substantially, and altered the family structure. Now a potential client contacted me wanting to purchase an exclusive license, or preferentially, a copyright transfer. (I know the latter would not be in my favor, is more complicated legally, and so on.) Am I running into any trouble by agreeing to sell the new, completed and refined, version of the font? Am I able to do that?
On a sidenote, to what extent is DaFont's '100% Free' label legally binding without a EULA? The FAQ says to always check the EULA, and since I failed to provide one, does it mean people have the right to use it commercially?
Comments
Side note: Seems to me you can't easily/reasonably stop people from redistributing the version that is already out there. You could still ask DaFont to take it down—not sure what the legal status/strength of that request of that would be, but nothing stops you from asking, right?
Just observe what George Thomas said. Even if it is not stricly illegal, to let the client know about the previous version is fair.
UN's WIPO has several documents with information about typeface protection.
Is this person intending to use this typeface as a permanent part of a company's branding? If so and if I were the client, I would insist on a copyright transfer since I would not be inclined to have someone else retain any ownership rights to a critical part of my company's brand identity.
I'm against permanent exclusivity since companies don't tend to use fonts forever and then the font just never gets used again which makes me sad (both for financial reasons and just cause). What we do is issue a license with permanent exclusivity that will lapse after 5 consecutive years of no public use. That is, the exclusivity lapses, all other rights remain in place.
@Cory Maylett is making the client side argument which i've never really understood. Literally most companies are using fonts which are not owned by them. It doesn't hurt them to do so.
Sure, it's easier to just own the rights but not so much easier that the cost to buy something outright right makes sense unless you're really attached to it, which most brands demonstrably are not. I think it's still true that the average company changes fonts about every 5 years (i've not checked recently). Even if that number has moved slightly, it's still the case that with most companies every new art director changes the fonts. It does depend some on the industry and specific business model but you get the idea.
I don't do exclusives so that's never an issue. When I client requests exclusivity, I give them my usual explanation about why I won't do it and they always go along with it. Not once did I have a client say "oh, well never mind then" when I refused exclusivity. Perhaps I've lost clients because they heard somewhere that I don't do exclusives. Some fonts wind up being exclusives since the types of changes requested are very specific to a client's needs. But there's no agreement that would prevent me from selling it if I wanted to.
* sometimes Fontname Custom, or whatever the client requests. Make sure you update the trademark field: Fontname is a trademark of you, Companyname is a trademark of Company.
That is exactly the case. I did something (partially) new, which hasn't been shared. So I tell the client I can only give exclusivity for the new thing. Or more precisely, for the new in the new thing.
How do you define “public”? Sounds difficult to monitor.