FOLLOWUP & REQUEST: Hershey Font Availability & Legality

[Pete Holzmann]

Thanks to all who responded to my request for info on the Hershey Fonts.

First, the official US Government answer:

The Hershey fonts were created by a person named Hershey at NBS. They are
distributed by NTIS. You can order them in various forms:

	ASCII Mag Tape: # PB263-925, $400
	MS-DOS Floppies (8): # PB 85-212-082, $300
	Hard Copy (included in the above): # PB 251-845, $16.50 (?)

To order: call 703/487-4763
To talk to the product manager (Stuart Weisman): 703/487-4807

NOW... here's the strange part, and the reason I included net.legal in
the newsgroup list:

I was informed by several people at NBS and NTIS that:

    1) Hershey fonts were created by a government agency and *are* in the
	public domain.
    2) NTIS maintains control over its distribution of the fonts. You may
	incorporate them into a product that is sold (not free), but you
	may not give the fonts away or sell them for less than what NTIS
	sells them for.

HOW CAN THIS BE????

    I mentioned that I've heard of people typing in the coordinates from the
    hardcopy themselves for a few of the fonts, from a book checked out at
    the library. He (Stuart Weisman) said that was fine, NTIS only wants to
    control copies that it distributes.

Has anybody out there typed in all of the font info? Maybe that could get
posted to the net or made available.

Might it make sense for a group to buy a copy of the machine readables on
behalf of the net and distribute it?

I'm confused! What does 'public domain' really mean???


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