

Frere-Jones is suing Hoefler for half of preeminent digital type foundry - tptacek
http://qz.com/167993/frere-jones-is-suing-hoefler-for-his-half-of-the-worlds-preeminent-digital-type-foundry/

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gruseom
This reminded me of the mother of all type designer business partner falling-
outs:

[http://www.economist.com/news/christmas-
specials/21591793-le...](http://www.economist.com/news/christmas-
specials/21591793-legendary-typeface-gets-second-life-fight-over-doves)

One difference, of course, is that digital type can't be dumped into the
Thames.

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Historiopode
I wonder if there's a way to preserve their cloud.typography service through
this. The article states that ownership of the fonts was transferred, but I
imagine most designers would disdain the very idea of subscribing if the
allegations turned out to be true.

Service aside, how is the company supposed to survive this? Even if Frere-
Jones wins the trial and full damages are awarded, surely he'll want to leave
the company. I can't fathom how you could keep collaborating with a partner
who tried to scam you out of a life's work. That'd leave H&FJ with much weaker
creative direction and a tarnished reputation.

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fishyninja
Implications for cloud.typography are quite worry some. Fought to convince
several agency clients to use the service in lough of image headlines -- would
hate for this to affect the service or more likely its license agreement for
specific faces. Not sure if cloud.typography is a separate legal entity or not
which could continue to license FJ faces if there was a falling out.

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taejo
> lough

I think you mean "lieu" (if you don't, it's not clear what you mean)

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fishyninja
correct

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pg_bot
H+FJ are in a class of their own in the world of typography, it would be a
tragedy if this caused their firm's demise.

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Silhouette
_H+FJ are in a class of their own in the world of typography_

Are they? That's a pretty insulting claim to make when you consider the
achievements of other giants of the typography world. Robert Slimbach at Adobe
has a similarly impressive portfolio, for example. If you look down any list
of the most popular fonts for use in professional typography, Adrian Frutiger
probably designed several of them. From a slightly different angle, Matthew
Carter was creating screen-optimised fonts decades before all these trendy web
font services with the luxuries of modern digital formats and hinting
technology came along, among other significant achievements. Hermann Zapf?
Carol Twombly?

H&FJ have made some very nice fonts. They've also made some so-so fonts, had
much more aggressive licensing terms than most major foundries, and arrived
several years late to the web fonts party. I'm sorry that their situation has
reached what we're hearing about today, but please let's not spend all day
indulging in hero worship.

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wmf
Wow, no written contract for over ten years? This can't end well.

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tptacek
H+FJ have repeatedly made public statements referring to an "equal
partnership". Oral contracts are enforceable. This sounds like it's going to
be extremely expensive for all involved.

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badman_ting
That was my thought too. Oral contracts can hold up, but boy would it have
been cheaper and easier to have this stuff in writing.

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tptacek
Holy shit.

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8ig8
Court docs:

[https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/fbem/DocumentDisplayServlet...](https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/fbem/DocumentDisplayServlet?documentId=ydQwzs4EZjDkplRrBmkkwA==&system=prod)

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caffeineninja
My world is collapsing. This is like when Disney bought Lucasfilm to Star Wars
geeks.

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civilian
Are you kidding? I'm happy to have the Star Wars franchise out of that fool
Lucas' hands.

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kitsune_
Out of one fool's hands right into the hands of another fool, J.J. Abrams.

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Wistar
Well, then, I guess they aren't as perfect as I had believed, having been
misled by their incredibly perfect output.

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gallerytungsten
From a quick read of the court filing, it appears Frere-Jones has the upper
hand here. If everything in the filing is true, I hope he wins, big-time.

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thrownaway2424
If a quick reading of the plaintiff's filings don't give you the impression
that they have been deeply wronged by the evil defendant, it's a bad filing.

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yan
Whoa, this is huge.

