Depending on the complexity I imagine fonts would also be smaller than corresponding bitmaps although I never actually checked.
Otherwise these fonts end up being used in a non-accessible way (I browse with webfonts disabled and keep seeing boxes instead of images, with no fallback or a useless display:none'd fallback).
For users who can't see the font the character will be completely meaningless. Instead of getting e.g. "Compatible with Linux!" they'll get "Compatible with reserved symbol U+E001!"
Urgh. Why do people do this?
Screen: https://twitter.com/simevidas/status/490104115826270208
# NOTE: The graphic image associated with the Apple logo character
# is not authorized for use without permission of Apple, and
# unauthorized use might constitute trademark infringement.
Also take a look at the note at the very bottom of the page:
Note: All brand icons are trademarks of their respective owners. The use of these trademarks does not indicate endorsement of the trademark holder by the author, nor vice versa.
http://www.rubyinside.com/david-heinemeier-hansson-says-no-t...
Why would I want to use someone else's icon ?
See also: "App developer", "Java developer", "mobile developer", etc. Contrast: "assembly programmer", "COBOL programmer".
Also, this guy is the authority, and he was talking to desktop devs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8To-6VIJZRE
I think the Go gopher is, rather than a trademark, a copyrighted work under a CC-Attribution license. The attribution to make this use of it legit could just be adding "Go gopher by Renee French, under CC-Attribution license" to the Note section. (See http://blog.golang.org/gopher.)