Accessible publishing is an approach to publishing and book design whereby books and other texts are made available in alternative formats designed to aid or replace the reading process. It is particularly relevant for people who are blind, visually impaired or otherwise print disabled. Alternative formats that have been developed to aid different people to read include varieties of larger fonts, specialised fonts for certain kinds of reading disabilities,

braille Braille (Pronounced: ) is a tactile writing system used by people who are visually impaired, including people who are blind, deafblind or who have low vision. It can be read either on embossed paper or by using refreshable braille disp ...

e-books An ebook (short for electronic book), also known as an e-book or eBook, is a book publication made available in digital form, consisting of text, images, or both, readable on the flat-panel display of computers or other electronic devices. Alt ...

, and automated

audiobook An audiobook (or a talking book) is a recording of a book or other work being read out loud. A reading of the complete text is described as "unabridged", while readings of shorter versions are abridgements. Spoken audio has been available in sc ...

s and DAISY digital talking books. Accessible publishing has been made easier through developments in technology such as

print on demand Print on demand (POD) is a printing technology and business process in which book copies (or other documents, packaging or materials) are not printed until the company receives an order, allowing prints of single or small quantities. While oth ...

(POD), e-book readers, the

XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable ...

structured data format, the EPUB3 format and the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

Aim

The aim of accessible publishing is to make reading easier for those who have difficulties doing so. This group includes people who are blind or who have low vision, people with learning disabilities, and people who are learning a second language. Accessible publishing also aims to allow people to read whichever format allows them to read fastest or allows them to absorb the information in a better way. In the twenty-first century, the accessible publishing aim is to make every book available in all formats so that every reader can read with ease and proficiency. Guidelines and techniques for publishing in accessible formats have been made available by several organisations and authors, including: * EDItEUR: "Accessible Publishing - Best Practice Guidelines for Publishers". * Matt Garrish: "Accessible EPUB 3" (freely available chapter from ''EPUB 3 Best Practices'' by Matt Garrish and Markus Gylling, O'Reilly, 2013). * "Accessible Digital Media Guidelines" by the National Center for Accessible Media (NCAM). * "Making PDF files accessible: guidelines for the DTP creation phase" by AcceDe PDF. * "Make a PDF document accessible from Adobe InDesign and

Acrobat Acrobatics () is the performance of human feats of balance, agility, and motor coordination. Acrobatic skills are used in performing arts, sporting events, and martial arts. Extensive use of acrobatic skills are most often performed in acro d ...

Pro" * "Make a PDF document accessible from

Microsoft Word Microsoft Word is a word processor, word processing software developed by Microsoft. It was first released on October 25, 1983, under the name ''Multi-Tool Word'' for Xenix systems. Subsequent versions were later written for several other pla ...

History

Before the 21st century, the publishing industry focused on the production of printed books. The predominant publishing theory, which stressed economy of scale, tended to make only one format of a given book available. In this way they could be mass-produced and made available for the general public. This model did not allow for any other format to be widely available, however. There were a number of developments in technology that increased the accessibility of books. The first of these was the development of the

writing system by Louis Braille in 1821. Then there was the development of audiobooks which originated from the

United States Congress The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is bicameral, composed of a lower body, the House of Representatives, and an upper body, the Senate. It meets in the U.S. Capitol in Washing ...

in 1931 and became popularised by advances in recording and the use of voice actors. In 1980, Thorndike Press came into existence as a republisher of large print books. Thorndike bought the rights for large print versions of books from publishers and then republished them in a larger and more accessible format for people with reading difficulties.

Recent developments

New portable readers, such as the Victor Reader products and the Plextalk Pocket handle talking books in a wide variety of formats including DAISY Digital Talking Book,

MP3 MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany, with support from other digital scientists in the United States and elsewhere. Origin ...

, text only, and many others. New technology, such as introduced in the

Sony Reader The Sony Reader was a line of e-book readers manufactured by Sony, who produced the first commercial E Ink e-reader with the Sony Librie in 2004. It used an electronic paper display developed by E Ink Corporation, was viewable in direct sunlig ...

of 2004 and Amazon's Kindle in 2007, provided the ability to alter the size of the font automatically. ReadHowYouWant is another leader in developing this technology. It works in partnership with publishers to make books available in all formats all across the world.ReadHowYouWant
Publishers
. This includes specially designed fonts for dyslexia,

macular degeneration Macular degeneration, also known as age-related macular degeneration (AMD or ARMD), is a medical condition which may result in blurred or no vision in the center of the visual field. Early on there are often no symptoms. Over time, however, som ...

and line tracking problems.

References

External links

National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped
(U.S. Library of Congress) distributes braille materials and Talking Books (custom analog and digital formats) free to blind and low vision users in the United States.
NFB-NEWSLINE
(non-profit) offers over 500 newspapers and magazines in a variety of accessible formats (including telephone, a website, email, and mobile app). A free service to blind and low vision US residents who qualify.
BookShare
(non-profit) offers books, newspapers, and magazines (in DAISY format) free to blind and low vision users who pay an annual membership fee.
Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic
offers recorded books in custom digital formats free to blind and low vision users.
Project Gutenberg
is a library of public domain books in text format free for download.
HumanWare
offers a large list of additional resources available for download.
Accessible Digital Office Document (ADOD) Project
techniques for creating accessible documents using various office suites such as

Microsoft Office Microsoft Office, or simply Office, is the former name of a family of client software, server software, and services developed by Microsoft. It was first announced by Bill Gates on August 1, 1988, at COMDEX in Las Vegas. Initially a marketi ...

OpenOffice.org OpenOffice.org (OOo), commonly known as OpenOffice, is a discontinued open-source office suite. Active successor projects include LibreOffice (the most actively developed), Apache OpenOffice, Collabora Online (enterprise ready LibreOffice) a ...

LibreOffice LibreOffice () is a free and open-source office productivity software suite, a project of The Document Foundation (TDF). It was forked in 2010 from OpenOffice.org, an open-sourced version of the earlier StarOffice. The LibreOffice suite co ...

and

iWork iWork is an office suite of applications created by Apple Inc. for its macOS and iOS operating systems, and also available cross-platform through the iCloud website. It includes the presentation application Keynote, the word processing and ...

. {{DEFAULTSORT:Accessible Publishing Publishing Accessible information

Aim

History

Recent developments

See also

References

External links