Font licensing for digital signage

Fonts are one of the many things we take for granted.  We see them everywhere yet we hardly give them a second thought.

Without fonts there would be no print media... no digital signage.  It's hard to think of a world without fonts.

In the days before computers and desktop publishing, type foundries manufactured and sold metal and wood typefaces for printing presses.  Modern type foundries now produce and distribute digital typefaces which we commonly refer to as "fonts".  Font usage is governed by a license that is granted by the type foundry (EULA or End User License Agreement).

Every PC operating system comes with a standard set of fonts and by now, everyone is familiar with Arial and Times Roman.  As computer usage has grown, so has the need for new typefaces and there are now literally thousands of type foundries that cater to every possible style.  Some fonts have even been optimized for viewing on e-book readers and tablets as type foundries keep up with new technologies.

It's important to understand how digital font licensing works, especially in the context of digital signage.
(***Disclaimer! - You must read the license agreement that governs the use of the fonts that you buy.  Each type foundry has its own rules so you must be aware of any restrictions in the font's usage policy.)

Generally speaking, fonts are licensed for use on the computer on which they are installed.  Seems pretty straightforward, right?  Let's see how this works...

• If you use a PC or Mac to create graphics, videos or animations that includes text you will need a license for the fonts used to create the content.
• There is no need to buy additional font licenses if your content uses the standard fonts delivered with your computer's operating system. You already paid for those.
• Any additional font you purchase and use to create your content needs to be licensed.  Each type foundry has its own usage policy so it's important to read the fine print.  Be careful when using "free" or Open Source fonts in your content as some free fonts are licensed for non-commercial use only.  You may need to purchase a commercial license for digital signage use (if available).
• If your CMS lets you create and render content on remote devices (PC players, Android devices and tablets...), you will need a license for each font used on each device.  If your CMS requires the font to also be installed on the Server PC, you will need a license for that font as well.
  
  It's important to know where the content is rendered.  If your CMS has a feature that lets you generate an image, video or Flash SWF that gets pushed to your players, the content is rendered on your local PC.  This means the font is embedded in the content and you don't need additional font licenses.
  
  You only need to purchase additional font licenses when the text is rendered on the playback device itself.  A good example of this would be a CMS with content authoring capabilities that requires fonts to be installed on every remote PC or Android device in order for the fonts to display properly.
  
  It is a subtle distinction but it is an important one.
• In some cases, type foundries may have very precise restrictions on how fonts can be used.  For example, some may mention digital signage use specifically.  With so many type foundries, it is very important to read the license before you start publishing your work. 

Fonts are necessary to our work and if we want type foundries to continue to create innovative products, we need to support them and that means licensing their products.

Here are a couple of useful resources:

• List of typefaces included with Mac OS.
• List of typefaces included with Windows OS.
• Links to type foundry end user license agreements (EULA).

photo credit: jm3 via photopin cc