> For example, the IRS official fonts are Helvetica and Times New Roman. If in a hypothetical world, those were eligible for copyright, they'd still be within the duration of eligibility. Would it then be a copyright violation to print my tax form? I think that's silly, and I think the lawmakers who decided this thought the same.
That's a weird hypothetical. Obviously, in that counterfactual world, the IRS would choose fonts that were either in the public domain or had permissive licenses.
Your hypothetical sounds like if speed limits on the highway were lowered, everyone would drive at the old speed and get a ticket, instead of adjusting their behaviour.
> Obviously, in that counterfactual world, the IRS would choose fonts that were either in the public domain or had permissive licenses.
there's nothing obvious about that at all; there are plenty of times when government agencies don't bend over backwards like that to ensure public access to their public-domain products. remember that what the fbi first investigated aaron swartz for was providing public access to pacer's court electronic records; pacer nominally stands for 'public access to court electronic records'
the westlaw page number fiasco is another example
you could even imagine a government rfq where different font foundries offer the irs the use of their fonts for below-market prices, thus gaining the right to charge people for printing their tax forms. and if you think that's an implausible level of corruption you probably haven't been following the ongoing saga of intuit's lobbying
You're right, it's a backwards hypothetical. Maybe in that world, NIST would have created a font for all to use.
> the IRS would choose fonts that were either in the public domain or had permissive licenses.
Presuming a suitable option existed at the time, without requiring the government to make one themselves.
It would be silly if, by default, the purchaser of a printing press has no legal right to print anything with it. Maybe we would have lived in a world where typewriter manufacturers had all of the power that publishers had/have, but even broader.
That's a weird hypothetical. Obviously, in that counterfactual world, the IRS would choose fonts that were either in the public domain or had permissive licenses.
Your hypothetical sounds like if speed limits on the highway were lowered, everyone would drive at the old speed and get a ticket, instead of adjusting their behaviour.