SPORSHO BRINGS OUT AN EXCLUSIVE PLATFORM FOR VISUALLY IMPAIRED PEOPLE IN BRAILLE…AND MORE NEWS..!!
Sporsho has created a platform for visually impaired people to learn more about art, culture, and literature through Braille books. Amar Ekushey Book Fair has been the one stop solution for readers in the country since its inception in 1972. Book-lovers from all over Bangladesh have been able to satiate their bookish cravings, but those who are visually impaired, have been deprived. This all changed in 2009 with establishment of Sporsho, a Braille book publication house located within the Bangla Academy premises. Nazia Jabeen, founder and publisher of Sporsho, began working on a Braille book “Chharar Tale Monta Dole” in 2009. When her book was published, and released at the Ekushey Book Fair, she realized the demand for Braille books was astounding and that there was a desperate need for a full-fledged Braille publishing house. (Full Report: https://goo.gl/lbSeKL )
A new wave of Canadian book companies taps in to the popularity of self-publishing. and help authors do it in a more professional way. “Everything we do is totally customized for the author and their book and their audience,” says Trena White, principal and co-founder of Vancouver-based Page Two Strategies. Her company offers a variety of services to authors, such as editing, design, marketing, and distribution support on a fee-for-service basis. In other cases, it acts as a traditional agent, representing authors to publishers. One thing Page Two can offer that conventional publishers can’t, says Ms. White, is speed. Page Two has also expanded into commissioning books. Its first, published through its imprint Page Two Books, was intended to capitalize on the summer’s Pokémon Go trend. (Full Report: https://goo.gl/S0zPlj )
Big Turnout for PubWest Conference. his weekend, 250 members of the publishing industry made their way to Portland’s Benson Hotel for PubWest’s annual conference. The theme of the show—“Better Together: 40 Years of Publishing Expertise”—celebrated the organization’s 40th anniversary in helping book publishers and related businesses succeed. The increase in attendance came even though the event was occurring almost simultaneously with the AWP being held in Washington, D.C. which prevented some publishers, like Stanfill, from attending PubWest. While this year's AWP conference got overtly political, with 300 attendees marching to the U.S. Capitol in protest, PubWest was largely celebratory and any reference to the current political climate came in through asides and jokes. (Full Report: https://goo.gl/SRSgBP )
Western Sydney University Provides E-Textbooks From 60 Academic Publishers to Students via ProQuest’s Ebook Central Platform. A ground-breaking collaboration between Western Sydney University and ProQuest provides digital textbooks for commencing university students through the University’s library. One of the world’s largest initiatives of its kind, Western Sydney University is differentiating itself from other universities by making etextbooks from 60 academic publishers available to students via ProQuest’s EBook Central. (Full Report: https://goo.gl/baVZRf )
PSPDFKit, the PDF Framework used in Dropbox and Evernote, is now Available in a Standalone App. In Android, applications can define intent filters that allow them to react to certain events such as tapping a URL or opening a file. Applications that can handle opening PDF files are quite numerous, so if a user does not like the features offered by their default PDF viewer, they can scour the Play Store for an alternative. But the abundance of choice can be overwhelming to the average user looking for a decent PDF viewer, so most users probably stick with the PDF viewer offered by Google or Adobe. For those of you looking for something more robust than Google’s offering and more well-designed than Adobe’s, we recently discovered PDF Viewer by PSPDFKit GmbH. (Full Report: https://goo.gl/hKqSeR )