One of the biggest and best established sellers of commercial fonts is MyFonts. But still - that’s over 100.000 files that shouldn’t be there. Granted, this also finds other versions of Helvetica, like Neue Helvetica (often bastardised as Helvetica Neue), or Helvetica in different weights, like helvetica-bold.ttf. We’re only searching for TTF or OTF files - no WOFF/WOFF2 or legacy formats like EOT and SVG (you’d get almost 150.000 hits otherwise). (This link will only work when you’re logged into Github.)Ī simple search shows that over 100,000 copies of Hevetica can be found on Github And yep, more than 100,000 copies are findable on Github. Let’s use the Github search API and see if we can find the most ubiquitous commercial font on the planet: Helvetica. When a commercial font ends up where it shouldn’t - for instance on a huge, freely searchable database of code - it’ll most certainly break the terms of the license, and once downloaded from there, it becomes a pirated font. Webfonts often charge depending on the amount of visitors your site has, and all of this is determined in the license you buy. You can’t usually just use a “desktop font” (bought with a license for use in applications like Photoshop or InDesign) in your web project. If you want to use a font on your website, the license must allow web usage in the first place. Most notably, you can’t give it to somebody else - not unless they buy their own license, you buy it for them, or the license allows you to transfer the license. This license tells you what you can and can’t do with the font. Some licenses even allow you to edit the font and redistribute it under another name.Ĭommercial fonts, on the other hand, you have to buy a license for.
Free fonts come with a license that allows you to use them, well, for free.
#TOP PIRATE FONTS HOW TO#
How Github became the web's largest font piracy site (and how to fix it)įonts, like other software, are available in two flavors: commercial, and free.