Over the years since Google Fonts’ debut in May of 2010, billions of users have viewed and often used the fonts in it’s directory as a way to better their SEO, and make web developing that much easier. Why wouldn’t you use the service? It simply requires a single line of code, and puts at your disposal, hundreds of beautiful and web safe fonts.
Well, as is with most of today’s big data hungry companies, there is a darker side to Google Fonts that not many are aware of, or put much stock into for that matter. Yes it has a dirty little secret, that although maybe technically legal. Could leave all of it’s users high and dry if something bad were to happen. But before we get into the dark and stormy details of the service, let’s get a little background as to why it was created.
What’s in it for Google?
To date Google Fonts has received over 25 trillion page views. That’s a lot of traffic. Even if the fonts are already stored in the user’s cache of the Chrome web browser. That is a ton of requests and data being transferred. I don’t think even the presidential website gets that type of traction in an election year.
But in the past, I’ve heard my peers compare Google Fonts to YouTube and Google Maps, because they all in some way benefit Google simply through their users being on the platform. But the cost of serving fonts is nothing compared to the cost of serving image and video files to millions of people.
However, there is a huge difference here.
Both YouTube and Google Maps are monetized through advertising. I really can’t come up with any way Google could use fonts in any monetizable strategy. That is unless they want to be just like every other web font producing brand out there.
So why did Google start Google Fonts?
There are so many reasons that I could come up with as to why Google would start a service to take control of the web font industry. But most simply put, starts and ends with one word, control. Especially around 2010 when creators and developers on the web stopped using imagery and Photoshop to get around the horrible look of default fonts, and the invention of web fonts took hold.
Reason #1: Using Text Instead of Images Improves Search
The use of images in place of text is obviously bad for many reasons. Requiring a designer to open up Photoshop in order to tweak the copy on your site isn’t an ideal workflow. Even if it is a little cheaper by the hour. But for Google this is especially bad because they can’t index content if it’s inside an image.
After all, SEO is the bread and butter product for Google. So improving their index of words, would improve their core product. And the better their core product, the more likely people will search on Google and use their AdWords ads. Really seems pretty straightforward.
Reason #2: The Caching of Google Fonts Improves Other Google Products
It may not always register with the user, but the computer’s browser sure remembers. Which makes it work faster, and creates a better user experience. So if Google takes the entire pie, or at least the majority of it when it comes to what fonts are used online, when you get to their site things will just naturally work better.
Think of it this way, if you go to Facebook, then Twitter, then Instagram, and finally end up looking something up on Google. Your computer will only have to download the Open Sans font once since each one of those sites uses that font and probably has used the Google Fonts API to host it on their sites. Where as if each and every site hosted the same font on their own servers, the browser will have to download the same font four times. Making the experience slower, and thus making it less likely that you will return to the site.
Reason #3: Google Just Wants Your Data
I don’t think this comes as a surprise to anyone. Google is a data collecting company, and has been since it’s founding. Now I know that there are a few out there that are gonna say, “No, Google started out humble until they started acting like an advertisement platform.” Well that is where you are wrong. Google’s primary goal from the get go was to organize and simplify the world’s information to make it more easily accessed for all. Which is another way of saying, “We want your data so we can take over the world.” No two ways about it.
Selling that data was just the added benefit that kept the growth of the company climbing to new heights in shorter timeframes. It’s as simple as 1 + 1 = ⏦
Reason #4: What’s Good for the Web is Good for Google
This one will probably be easiest to grasp for you business majors out there. Basically if someone or something does good for the internet, or pioneers an amazing new product for the internet. Google will either become the new leader of that new service, or be one of the first to piggy back on that new product to create increased revenue for Google.
“Why web fonts? Why would we care? The way I think about it is, the web is core to Google—there’s no doubt about that. And fonts are core to the web. And so we see web fonts as a really exciting technology that we could use to improve all our products.”
~David Kuettel, Google Fonts Engineer
This all makes sense to me accept for one part, how does one measure what is good for the internet? I mean certain things like prettier fonts attracting more people makes total sense to me. But guessing what trend to jump on next seems to be a bit of lofty pipe dream to me that will eventually cause the company some sort of reckoning.
So let’s say that Google chose a product and something went wrong. It could be within Google Fonts, or even some sort of other branch of the company. What could go wrong with Google’s font service?
Problem #1: Blanket Font Licenses
If you’re like anyone else who gets something for free, or just downloaded something online. You probably aren’t going to be reading through their privacy agreement, or even the licensing that allows you to use what you just consumed. Well, I’ve read Google’s blanket license agreement for using their fonts. And let me tell ya, it’s kinda sketchy.
Where as all the information is there to make it completely legal for you to use the font, the terminology is so vague that really anyone could use it to mass distribute any font they created. The only thing that seems to make it differentiated per download is the font’s name and url that is listed at the top of the document. Essentially saying, “Hey, this font at the top here. It’s protected by all that below.” Which at first sounds great right? Wrong.
It’s wrong because you are essentially relying on the fact that Google has contacted the creator of said font, and set up some sort of contract or agreement so that they, the creator, is compensated properly. Would you rely on a complete stranger to do that for you as you use their product?
Probably not; and even if you were sued or sent a cease and desist to remove the font from your website. Do you really want to go through the legal hassle of battling Google in court?
Problem #2: Google Fonts Enters the Google Graveyard
Yes, there is such a thing as the Google Graveyard, and man has it been filling up over the years. But what if Google Fonts enter that graveyard? What would happen to the everyone’s beautiful web fonts?
Most likely there would be a time where a vast majority of the internet would be sent back to the times before 2009 / 2010. When the internet was written in Helvetica and Times New Roman. Now most people would probably notice this change, unless they are web or graphic designers. They might get a little pissed off. But overall things will be updated over time by developers downloading web fonts that have Open Font Licenses and hosting those fonts themselves on the server of their choice.
Problem #3: Google Sells or Accidentally Shares Your Data
Once again, Google is a data collecting company that does it’s job very well. Whether it be through what you search on your site, to using their products, to placing back end cookies that you aren’t even aware of when you’re off their product. They are tracking you everywhere, even through their fonts. And all it takes is the government or some militias hacker to find the weak code in your site, or even on Google’s servers to access everything and anything that you’ve been doing since you used your first Google product.
Either way it is possible for Google to be developing a personal profile on you. They already have tried to do it through the reading of emails through Gmail. With the justification that ads on Gmail will be better targeted if that information is by Google to attract more advertisers. What’s to say they don’t stop there?
Simply put, it is really that easy to have small or large issue with Google Fonts. Just like any other wide ranging data collecting, and organizing platform. It’s just a matter of weighing the pros and cons, while crossing your fingers and hoping for the best.
But seriously what is Google Fonts, a help or a hindrance? Only time will tell.
