MyFonts
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
MyFonts is a distributor of digital fonts, based in Cambridge, MA, selling fonts through the www.myfonts.com web site. It launched in September 1999 (during the ATypI conference in Boston), and started selling fonts in March 2000.
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[edit] Open marketplace
Both large type foundries and the studios of individual type designers (also often called foundries) are well represented at MyFonts. Linotype's classics such as Helvetica and Univers sit alongside newer fonts from Mark Simonson, Nick Curtis and Ronna Penner. In all, fonts from 358 foundries (January 2008 figure) are available for sale.
MyFonts is open to any foundry that can be sure their fonts may legally be sold, and that can produce technically sound fonts. Notably, there is no aesthetic barrier to selling your fonts at MyFonts, meaning that there are many ugly fonts on sale. However poor designs tend to appear less commonly while searching and browsing because such lists are, by default, ordered in descending order of popularity.
Although MyFonts is a division of Bitstream Inc. (which is a type foundry among other things), MyFonts claims to treat the parent company just like any other foundry, without favoritism. Instead, MyFonts claims that sales figures alone determine a new font's appearance in such high-visibility places as the Starlets page and the Rising Stars e-mail newsletter.
[edit] Font identification
MyFonts has a feature for identifying fonts from scanned images called WhatTheFont. A typical usage is in three stages: 1) the image is uploaded to the WhatTheFont page; 2) the user is asked if the letters in the image have been recognized correctly; 3) after about a second the system returns with a list of matches for the typeface. For clean scans of fonts that are in the MyFonts database, a correct or close identification is common. Whatever happens, the user then has the option of asking the "WhatTheFont Forum" of real volunteers to identify the typeface: the competitive element helps get quick identification. MyFonts has not provided details of the algorithms behind WhatTheFont.
[edit] Appearance
MyFonts has a distinctive appearance characterized by cartoon animals and "cute" graphics. While this look has been criticized by many professional designers, MyFonts claims that it helps font newbies to feel unintimidated by the idea of buying and installing fonts.
[edit] Sales claims
MyFonts claims to have sold 3,767,340 fonts from their collection of 58,594 different font styles (January 2008).
