E-books for all: Towards an Accessible Digital Publishing Ecosystem

Accessibility is becoming increasingly important in the publishing industry. Thanks to the opportunities offered by new standards and digital reading technologies a new paradigm is emerging: produce accessible publications and distribute them through traditional distribution channels, so that people with print disabilities can enjoy reading and benefit from the same opportunities and wide choice as any other reader.

The new European and international legislative framework is reinforcing the demand for accessible content, not only by encouraging the production of digital accessible books, but also by requiring that the whole value chain embraces accessibility. In particular, the recently approved European Accessibility Directive, the so-called European Accessibility Act, invites the entire digital publishing industry to become accessible to disabled and elderly people.

At this regard, Fondazione LIA published a paper which aims to be an agile manual, providing an overview of the different aspects involved for all the players in the book value chain: content producers, aggregators and digital distributors, online bookstore and platforms, developers of reading solutions and organizations managing the Books in Print Catalogues. For each actor it identifies the role it may play in an accessible ecosystem, highlights the critical elements to be considered and references the international standard specifications or guidelines in the field of accessibility.