Making Books Accessible: 2017 London Book Fair

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This is an annual seminar, coordinated by the Publishers Association’s (PA) Accessibility Action Group. The main goal is to help publishers tackle accessibility issues and meet requirements.

Mark Bide served as a Chair on March 16th.  Speakers were Emma House, Richard Orme, and Bill McCoy.

Emma House, Director of Publisher Relations at the PA, opened with a briefing on the Marrakesh Treaty. Following the PA Guidelines, publishers gain a clear understanding of what is required of them and who can provide assistance.

Richard Orme, Chief Executive Officer of the DAISY Consortium, focused on Google.org funded work to define a “Baseline for Accessibility”. Richard’s slides are available on SlideShare.

Bill McCoy explored the latest version of the EPUB standard. EPUB 3.1 includes the new accessibility specification for EPUB,  providing publishers with the most accessible mainstream file format for digital publishing. Bill provided an update on how publishers can make the most of its features.