Oded Ezer and Michal Sahar have a new batch of Hebrew typefaces complete. Email Oded and he’ll reply with a PDF of the latest catalog. Take a look through his portfolio, too, especially the poster work — lots of compelling stuff in Hebrew and English.

new, lovely and free from rick and dakota at thirstype: twiggies. has the same luxurious nature as notcaslon, which i love and have used quite extensively, without the creepy addams family overtones.

Rubberboy.

There is a new font editor for the geek in all of us. PFAEdit is an open source font editor developed for the Linux operating system. Designed to work similar to Fontographer, PFAEdit offers a robust interface including nearly all of the standard utilities, options and workspace environments designers are familiar with. Although still rough around the edges, and a bit in between, it is certainly a great first step for designers looking for a way out of their current OS or who can’t afford a commercial package. With added interest and support, PFAEdit could take its place in the commercial design arena as a viable choice for small firms and freelancers.

Windows and OSX versions are also available.

We all are aware that software piracy is is bad. We all are aware that font piracy is not any better, just because they are so small in size and numerous. We all are aware, though, that prices for font licenses are rather hefty for the average student, et al.

Underware, makers of Dolly and Sauna have a unique way to prevent students from behaving unlawfully:

The beautiful and inexpensive (I paid EUR 10,—) specimen book for the Dolly typeface family contains also a CD-ROM with the complete font. Also on the disc is a punkrocky audio track of an as yet unknown singer/band. Alongside the font comes a ReadMe, explaining that you will have to purchase a (quite reasonably priced, I think) license to legally use the fonts. It further states:

I can’t escape this?

No. The only exceptions are officially recognized places of education. A free license will be provided for educational users.

I mailed them about my educational license, and very fast came a friendly reply from Akiem of Underware who explained that because I was a student a license was not neccessary for me to legally use Dolly. (I will, for the case of FontPolice or BSA raids, print that e-mail out :-] ).

If more foundries (and software companies in general) took this approach, this would be a more type-aware world. Imagine students (and I am not talking about a few maniacs like my humble self, I am talking about the masses of graphic design students) really appreciating the value of — let’s say — FrutigerNext over a cheap ripoff like Frutus (err... no, wait... it seems I can not find it, but I guess you know what I mean). Or Dolly over the standard windows corefont TNR. I think the potential of “addicting” students to good quality is worth more than the one or odd lost licenses when a font’s use calls for the educational (no-)license agreement.

Most foundries are quite different, though. Last year, when I called Berthold for informational material concerning the new Akzi series and the 100+ years of Akzi history, explaining that I needed it for university, they quite harshly told me to email them about it. I didn’t want any fonts, mind you. I just wanted some paper! Guess if they ever replied to my email.

See also: Akiem Helmling and Ice Cream Cone