Inclusive publishing ecosystem. A roadmap for born accessible content
The concept
Digital technologies provide incredible opportunities to facilitate access to reading for people with visual disabilities. To fully exploit the potential, strong collaboration among all players in the book value chain is essential.
In recent years considerable progress in the field of accessibility has been made, thanks to the collaboration among publishing sector, standard setting organizations and associations representing visual impaired people.
However there are still margins for improvements and in order to achieve full accessibility in the whole publishing ecosystem, other actors of the value chain, such as technology companies, distribution platforms and e-commerce sites have to be involved. Further efforts are required for the development of fully accessible e-reading solutions (software and device).
One of the starting points for the workshop is the “Baseline for born accessible EPUB” document, whose aim is to foster, thanks to a consensus approach, a more inclusive publishing ecosystem.
The workshop will provide participants with an updated overview on the state of the art of accessibility in the field of digital publishing, gathering experience, knowledge and skills of all those already involved. The workshop will also contribute to the definition of common strategies for further collaboration and to the development of new models of production, distribution and use of accessible digital content.
It also aims to bring the attention of the institutions on the most promising areas for public investment and on the actions needed to support the ecosystem to be more accessible.
Agenda of the seminar
9.30 Greetings
10.00 Baseline for born accessible EPUB
George Kerscher, Secretary General DAISY Consortium
10.30 Accessibility, the role of standards
Daniel Weck, Software Architect and Programmer EDRLab
11.00 The DIAGRAM Center: Accessible Images & Math
Betsy Beaumon, President Benetech
11.30 Coffee break
12.00 Accessible e-Reading Systems – Ensuring that baseline accessibility reaches the end users
Luca Ciaffoni, Software Analyst and Developer, Accessibility Expert Istituto dei Ciechi Francesco Cavazza
Avneesh Singh, COO – Strategy & Operations – DAISY Consortium
12.30 Accessibility metadata through the distribution value chain
Paola Mazzucchi, Business Development manager of mEDRA
13.00 Lunch break
14.00 Case studies on collaboration
LIA Foundation – Cristina Mussinelli, Secretary General LIA Foundation
ABC Consortium – Monica Halil, Head of the Accessible Books Consortium Secretariat
Load2learn – Richard Orme, CEO DAISY Consortium
15.00 Round table discussion: Paths to further collaboration
Jean-Marie Geffroy, CEO and Founder of Mantano
Giulio Blasi – Managing Director of Horizons Unlimited
16.30 Open discussion
17.30 Conclusions