In the Free Software Movement, we believe computer users should have the freedom to change and redistribute the software that they use. The “free” in free software refers to freedom: it means users have the freedom to run, modify and redistribute the software. Free software contributes to human knowledge, while non-free software does not. Universities should therefore encourage free software for the sake of advancing human knowledge, just as they should encourage scientists and other scholars to publish their work.

As for free software, universities should encourage the use of free fonts, just for the sake of theirs employees, scientists and students. Free fonts are fonts the users have the freedom to use, modify and redistribute (you can find some of them here). Since I don’t have the technical abilities to modify fonts, here is a short story about the “use” and “redistribution” aspects …

The University of Liege chose a new logo in which they use the Bliss Medium font. The university is giving some variations around the logo but none of these variations include white letters on a transparent background (the version I want for my poster with a coloured background). Since I don’t have the freedom to obtain and use this font (it costs £125 or €180 and I can’t redistribute it), I can’t create the simple variation I want. Fortunately, a graphic artist from the university did it for me. After some modifications of her image (no font, of course!), here is the result:

If one were using free fonts, this logo including my two labs would have taken 2 minutes … With a free font, all the ULg scientists could have included this new lettering in all kind of papers and this will be the start of a general “corporate feeling” in this university ⁽¹⁾…

Title and first paragraph from “Releasing Free Software if you work at a University” 😉
⁽¹⁾ Next time, I’ll write about the urgent need of a common policy about how to refer to the ULg in English. For the moment, in English papers, I’ve seen at least 3 names: University of Liege, Liege University, Université de Liège (and I don’t count variations including the accent or not) …

• Lab life
• My life