Japanese law doesn’t consider font itself or the style to be copyrighted, but font files are considered “program” (it is very broad in jurisdictional sense, roughly translates to “digital data that produce products through computational process”, and displaying letters on monitor is applicable) and thus fall under under copyright protection.
That’s what I was saying with the .ttf file being copyright. It’s entirely possible to generate a new “program” that produces the same shapes while being a brand new uncopyrighted program. There’s an infinite number of ways to describe how to draw a shape, only the one in the original file is copyright.
IANAL but again, the program is not program in general sense. The real “program” part here is ttf format and protocol around there, but protection goes over ttf data as a whole. It may be able to argue if such new font display system is developed and used, practically no gamedev/publishing industries want to reinvent the wheel and built the ecosystem from scratch.
Also, the infringement criteria is not necessarily on process but also end results similarity and intention in Japanese law. When intention comes up in argument defendant often provide proof they did not have access to the original data and end products, not sure how in the case of font.
Japanese law doesn’t consider font itself or the style to be copyrighted, but font files are considered “program” (it is very broad in jurisdictional sense, roughly translates to “digital data that produce products through computational process”, and displaying letters on monitor is applicable) and thus fall under under copyright protection.
That’s what I was saying with the .ttf file being copyright. It’s entirely possible to generate a new “program” that produces the same shapes while being a brand new uncopyrighted program. There’s an infinite number of ways to describe how to draw a shape, only the one in the original file is copyright.
IANAL but again, the program is not program in general sense. The real “program” part here is ttf format and protocol around there, but protection goes over ttf data as a whole. It may be able to argue if such new font display system is developed and used, practically no gamedev/publishing industries want to reinvent the wheel and built the ecosystem from scratch.
Also, the infringement criteria is not necessarily on process but also end results similarity and intention in Japanese law. When intention comes up in argument defendant often provide proof they did not have access to the original data and end products, not sure how in the case of font.