New Type, Low Price
The launching of Future Fonts is creating some buzz in the type community. The gist of it is that type designers offer their work in progress at a low price. Lizy Gershenzon explains its pricing model:
Future Fonts also makes financial sense for both type designers and buyers. Without devaluing the work, you can get typefaces at a cheaper price. This is because they are still in progress and don’t cost as much as their final releases. As more work is completed and new versions are added, the price goes up. Early buyers lock in at the cheapest rate and get free updates along the way. It’s a win, win, with extra incentive to buy typefaces early.
It’s a fascinating concept, but Future Fonts doesn’t work for me personally because the fonts do not have Vietnamese support. In a way, Future Fonts is similar to David Jonathan Ross’s Font of the Month Club, which I am a member, but David makes his fonts available in as many languages as possible and I really appreciate that.