Can I use the font 'Swis721 Ex BT' commercially?

[MRSL01]

I am having difficulty determining whether I can use the font 'Swis721 Ex BT' commercially, particularly for a logo. This font does not appear in Adobe Fonts but is included as a built-in font in Photoshop. Can anyone clarify the licensing for this font?

[Bobby Henderson]

The Swiss 721 BT type family is an imitation of Helvetica released by the Bitstream type foundry back in the 1980's. As far as I know Swiss 721 has never been bundled with Adobe applications. The type family has been included with other applications. CorelDRAW has included Swiss 721 and many other Bitstream fonts since the mid 1990's. Swiss 721 may be included with WordPerfect (also owned by Corel). Bitstream's fonts have been bundled with some industry specific graphics applications, such as certain sign making apps. It's likely the Swiss 721 fonts wound up installed on your computer via a different application.

The Bitstream foundry has been defunct since 2012; it was acquired by Monotype.

[J E L]

@MRSL01, do you have Adobe Illustrator? You should if your work includes creating commercial logos. If you have the font installed on your computer, here is a method to use a font commercially in a logo while complying with font licensing agreements. All you need to do is outline the font to create a vector shape that mimics the font’s appearance.

• Open your file in Adobe Illustrator and identify the text you want to outline.
• Select the text using the Selection Tool (V).
• Go to Type > Create Outlines.
• Illustrator will convert the text into a vector shape, allowing you to edit and manipulate it as a custom design.

I do this for all logos I create. I also slightly customize some or all of the letters to make the logo truly unique. Hope that's helpful!

https://helpx.adobe.com/fonts/using/font-licensing.html. “Yes, you can modify or decorate type that you have converted to outlines. The resulting image may be copyrighted or registered as a trademark, or used in commercial products. You may not make changes to the font software file itself.”

[Bobby Henderson]

The funny legal thing with fonts is a company can copyright or even trademark the name of a typeface, but they can't copyright the shapes of the letters. This is one reason why we have so many copycat versions of Helvetica or Helveti-clones, such as Swiss 721 by Bitstream, Nimbus Sans by URW and Triumvirate by Compugraphic Design Studio. And now Monotype owns all of those. Haha.

There is a catch with that letter shapes rule: software data is protected by copyright. It's not legal for one company to simply take the font file data from another company, change the font names and re-sell them. If they're going to copy those letter shapes they have to re-draw them.

For example, there are numerous versions of Futura made by different type foundries. None are exactly identical to each other. Create a string of text set in Paratype's Futura PT. Overlap it with a copy of that text string set in Futura BT by Bitstream, or Futura ND by Neufville Digital or Futura Now from Monotype. There will be all kinds of subtle (and not so subtle) differences.

Those differences can be a very real hazard in things like sign making. If someone has a channel letter building sign whose faces have been damaged by hail the replacement faces likely need to be made from the original art files. But if the original files are several years old and still have live type objects the same exact font files used in the design work will be needed.

I've made it a habit to convert live type objects to outlines in logo designs, sign designs and some other kinds of graphic design projects. I've experienced opening old art files in graphics applications several versions newer and seen live type objects do some crazy things, particularly if live effects (such as text on path) were applied. Some font formats have gone obsolete. Other colleagues at my work place have to open my design files on other computers for production work. They can't be hit with missing fonts messages.

Converting live type objects to outlines may not work for everyone's work flow. And it isn't all that great for blocks of body copy. But things like logos and word marks really should be converted into raw outlines. Those kinds of elements tend to be distributed to lots of different people.