Meeting minutes
<wendyreid> date: 2024-05-10
Digital Publishing Summit May 31, 2024
George: EDRLab is doing a 1-day conference
… I'm doing a short keynote
… one thing I plan to say is that we've made huge strides in accessibility but there's still a long way to go
… people still don't know what EPUB is, at least in higher ed
… people that take the time to learn about it love it but it's still second to PDF
… there's a long way to go in adoption, understanding, and promotion
… there are still a lot of features I see being developed in the CG and passed to reading systems
Tzviya: do you want the Steering Committee involvement?
George: I want promotion
… Daisy is doing its part in the a11y community, particularly in higher ed
… US and Canada work is going well
… I don't know about Europe
Wendy: a problem I've heard, even as recently as a couple of months ago, speaking with people in Europe ...
… had I heard about publishers' skepticism about EPUB3, borne by rendering issues
… I said I'd love to know what those issues are, as I'm not aware of them
… this relates to our efforts to get the industry to move from EPUB2 to EPUB3
… if there is skepticism due to rendering issues, we need to know what those issues are
… I think we have answers to all but we need to know where the skepticism is coming from
Liisa: I'm hearing from colleagues in Europe not that there's skepticism; they know they will need to move to EPUB3 for a11y
… but the issue is over updating catalogs
… and the rendering of HTML is inconsistent across platforms
… they don't have the resources to test across all platforms so they go to the lowest common denominator
George: epubtest.org is coming out with new tests
… but this has nothing to do with HTML rendering
… we have one SVG rendering test
… and some MATHML tests
… we could test HTML rendering across platforms
… I know how much work is it to do a11y testing
… we could do the rendering testing collectively
… and get rendering agents acting properly
<tzviya> https://
Tzviya: there was a discussion on the APA list; "a manifest for accessibility"
… it had a lot of old and incorrect information
… comparison with WCAG is not this group's issue
… but let's be sure to tell everyone that we are up to speed with the most current version of WCAG
<Zakim> tzviya, you wanted to mention a11y discussions about epub v pdf
Avneesh: I'm working on that
… scheduling some meetings
Bill: those insights are really important; it had not occurred to me that epubtest is a11y testing
… if that could be expanded to include rendering, that would be very useful
… but as George pointed out it's also a lot of work
… my perception on the a11y question is that EPUB3 is how you get accessible ebooks
… if that message is not getting across it's really terrible
Wendy: I'd caution against us trying to figure this out from our side
… we don't know how people are building their books
… we'd have to guess how every publisher is constructing their books
… it's more useful to reach out to the various publishing associations and figure out their needs
<Bill_Kasdorf> Great points, Wendy, thanks!
Wendy: from the perspective of having to test many publishers across the world, I've found some really wild things people are doing
… it would be near impossible to replicate all of that
… a lot of a11y in EPUB3 is highly dependent on the features of the platform
… whether the platform is well-integrated with the operating system, etc.
… it's better for us to find out what the problems are
Tzviya: +1
Industry Workshop at TPAC in September (EAA and Publishing)
Tzviya: there was some discussion at the previous two meetings
Avneesh: wondering about the scope
… September TPAC will be in California
… are we address concerns of the US market or of Europe?
… I don't think W3C has many European publishers as members
… I don't think we'd be successful at getting European publishers to this TPAC
Wendy: I talked about this with Ivan and Shinya
… EAA is one topic we could talk about, but this would naturally focus on North American publishers
… instead, we could focus on what's next; what's the future of the digital publishing activity
… with topics like scholarly publishing, what are the gaps, how do we further publication manifest
… it may be easier to attract that audience to California
<Zakim> tzviya, you wanted to talk about larger scope of EAA on rest of web
Wendy: I do need to submit a request for space in a couple of weeks
Tzviya: another topic is to take advantage of being with other W3C groups and talking about EAA
… W3C also has a ton of work on web payments; maybe a session on a11y and payment
… talking about the tentacles of a11y
… this would need to be coordinated with WAI; it wouldn't be specifically a "publishing" workshop
… talking about publishing, payments, and maybe other areas [of a11y]
Liisa: would we consider hybrid so Europeans could participate?
Tzviya: it will all be hybrid
… I expect we'd have some of our community from Europe
Wendy: it's driven from publishing but it's a larger web concern
… a multi-spec issue
… it's something that I think multiple groups will have something to say
… e.g. how text-to-speech works and could work
Leslie: for RS or for those who have specific solutions for ebooks?
Wendy: there's not a lot of understanding of how a TTS engine actually derives what it's going to say when reading a document
… it's not formal standardization but documentation on best practices
… so people building TTS engines can provide the best experiences
… e.g. reading the alt text as well as the "visible" text
… we'd have to talk with Kevin White to see what interest there is
George: I sent an invitation to the RS Testing group
… Hadrian is a guest speaker this coming Tuesday to talk about his work on TTS
… we're trying to get developers of read-aloud functions to come together
… there are a lot of issues; how to present alt text, how to present MathML, etc.
… many issues on how to provide a high-quality experience
<wendyreid> +1
Tzviya: should we try to pull together some kind of workshop at TPAC?
<Bill_Kasdorf> +1
<liisamk> +1 to doing something there
<tzviya> +1
Tzviya: anyone opposed?
<liisamk> I do not plan to be there
<wolfgang> +1 (but could not attend in person)
<Bill_Kasdorf> Unsure whether I'll be able to attend
<Leslie> Not attending
Tzviya: seems there is rough consensus to work on a workshop
… I'm imagining a half-day
Graham: [on Zoom chat:] Not on IRC – yes to a workshop, but be wary that this is not an event that Europeans other than Gregorio, Christina take part in regularly
George: [on Zoom chat] will not be going
Tzviya: I'll work with Ivan, Kevin, and Ralph; does that make sense?
George: yes
Tzviya: in the past we've sent explicit invitations to people we think would be interested
… and also request fee waivers
… we'll talk about topics
… we need replacement leadership for the CG
… as Wolfgang needs some time off
Wendy: it would be great to narrow down exactly what we want to do at the workshop
… I'd like an idea of what direction we're heading more specifically
George: what about holding a workshop at a place publishers would be coming?
<AvneeshSingh> +1
George: we used to hold sessions at BEA
… I think BookWorld is still happening
Liisa: Cristina and I have been talking about a Pub BG meeting in June to bring together folks who are looking at some of the rendering and testing challenges
… to see if we can start to collect some of that
… also, Leslie and I have been talking about what we discussed at the previous meeting; doing a listening tour to hear what other groups are talking about
… and maybe a co-branded event with BISG
Tzviya: I think working with BISG is a great idea
<AvneeshSingh> +1 Lisa
Tzviya: BookWorld and Frankfurt/London Book Fair tend to attract sales execs
… co-locating with DBW may not be effective
… but working with BISG would be a really good idea
… I'm not sure working on rendering issues is worth our time unless the RS folk are fully on board
… we should focus on what problems we can solve
… everyone's rendering issues are going to be different
<liisamk> I am not as defeatist as you are
<graham> Agreed Frankfurt and London are events focussed on the rights trade. There is a small and dedicated attendance from metadata people because of the mini-conferences we (EDItEUR) run – but that maybe 50 people, some of whom fly in for the day
Leslie: I'm feeling that 15 years ago we had active conversations in the Digital Issues Working Group of the AAP
… it was an opportunity to talk about the issues of the day, and have a forum for conversation
<graham> They aren't 'e-book people' necessarily though.
Leslie: that won't happen at TPAC; we need to go to where the publishers are
… we can have a role in encouraging those conversations
… we can do that with the UK Publishers Association as well
… AAP does not function in the same way [as 15 years ago] so we can't have the Digital Issues discussion there
… but we could reach out to BISG
… get input from the publishers and community about the issues
… and have conversations about whatever the issue of the day is
Avneesh: summing up; I'd say merging the IDPF Board into the Publishing Steering Committee is a very good idea
… we should focus on issues that need cross-pollination with the W3C community
<graham> The UK PA is a much more politically-focussed organisation now. It has hived off our most active technical committee/working group, the PAAG. However, PAAG remains very active in a largely independent way
Avneesh: this group should drive all the things Leslie and Liisa mentioned
… this group should coordinate the separate communities, not try to merge them
… focus on what needs cross-pollination and reach out to the publishing community where it is
Bill: I'm fully supportive of a BISG connection
… a lot of this discussion has been book-focused
… in other areas, such as scholarly publishing, books are no longer the focus
… university presses all routinely do EPUB3 and focus on a11y
… those are easy; they have fixed layout, etc.
… in scholarly they have journals and platforms; those are not the book issues
… in choosing to focus on books we won't have interest from the scholarly community
Tzviya: I think we realize we have a book focus
… we can reach out to organizations such as Learning Ally
… we've reached out to Scholarly and they haven't been interested
… how we tap into higher ed is a good question
… I look forward to hearing how the conversation with Brian@BISG goes
George: BISG is very interested in a11y metadata
… I've been attending their meetings
Graham: Bill is correct; organizations such as BISG are great places to look for collaboration but don't just focus on BISG; there are similar organizations in other countries, such as AIE in Italy
… the difficulty will be finding the right departments / right people in those organizations
… one needs to look wider than only BISG
… the net needs to be cast widely
<Bill_Kasdorf> BISG is definitely US focused; BookNet Canada is the rest of North America
Graham: by analogy, on the metadata side we deal with roughly 15 organizations
… that takes a lot of effort
Tzviya: I guess we do need to define our goals
Liisa: nobody is suggesting BISG is the only place to go; we suggested a listening tour to get feedback from many organizations
… and pull together an idea of what people around the world need, where they are thinking we should go next
… whether a standard we already have, or a standard with a missing piece
… I don't think we have a good connection to what people want and need right now
… there may not be long-term coordination with all these organizations but we should start with some outreach
<Bill_Kasdorf> Audiobooks and manga/comics are definitely within the "book" scope.
Leslie: you all are looking for onramps; what standards people need
… I come from a different place: there are ways now to convey an AI opt-out
… the standards work has been done by the CG and by Editeur
… but there's still work to sell this to the publishers to use
… we used to have a forum to have the conversation about what this is, why you want to do it
… that's missing
… Cristina is going around Europe to advise
… but nobody is doing that in the US
… I'm looking to encourage those conversations
… not just in the specific AI conversation, but it would also be a place to answer concerns about EPUB3
… without those fora things are left to fester
George: I have a question about leadership of the steering committee
… it would be great to have someone who is not a W3C veteran; somebody in publishing who has their finger on the pulse of publishing today
… and more independent of W3C; we tend to see things through a W3C lens
<Zakim> tzviya, you wanted to ask how we involve these groups instead of just interview
George: the IDPF Board has some business to do; one question is who from that Board could help chair this steering committee
Tzviya: +1
… I completely agree with Leslie
… we had a network of organizations plugged into the standards work and doing evangelism
… it was small scale but for those organizations involved it was very important
… we had lots of different perpsectives
… it's about plugging everyone in
… it's a great idea to work with other publishing associations around the world but we need to have a way for them to follow up
<graham> This app note on the subject of AI and AI outputs https://
Tzviya: we need to figure out how to allow people to participate without paying a membership fee
Bill: a large constituency who are very book-focused and not often in the conversation is libraries
… we've involved some of them a bit in a11y metadata, particularly in MARC records
… I've observed often over the years that librarians tend to have a more technical staff than most publishers
… libraries can be very useful
George: very good point
Graham: you're talking specifically about academic libraries
… public libraries do not have those technical people and are getting rapidly hollowed-out
Bill: yes
Tzviya: is the goal to talk about the goals of each of those sectors or to involve them in the work?
Bill: libraries are very concerned about the accessibility of their resources
… they manage the resources but cannot make them accessible
Liisa: we probably need to stabilize the core before we expand
… we need leadership, more involvement, bring people together, figure out what we're doing next
… settle some of that and then look outward
Tzviya: the biggest action item seems to be to talk with Brian@BISG
… is there someone who will reach out the the British Publishing Association?
<Bill_Kasdorf> The PAAG--Publishing Accessibility Action Group--is very important
Tzviya: is there someone who will reach out the the UK Publishing Association?
Graham: PAAG may be a better organization in the UK
… I take BIC as a given, but it doesn't have a working group specifically looking at this
… I will talk with them
<Bill_Kasdorf> PAAG is UK but has non-UK members
Wendy: BIC is the British BISG
… and I can reach out to Booknet Canada
… I still know some people in Boersenverein
Liisa: and the JPA
Wolfgang: I know the person at Boersenverein who is focused on digital publishing
Leslie: Liisa and I can come up with a proposed template for the conversation
Tzviya: that would be fantastic
Graham: we often have an informal meeting with Booknet Canada, BISG, and Editeur
… I'd be happy to raise this in our fortnightly informal meeting
Wendy: that would be great
Tzviya: Wendy and I will schedule a separate meeting to talk about a workshop or "salon" at TPAC
Graham: it would be helpful to have 3 bullet points for what we want from those meetings
next meeting
Tzviya: next call is scheduled for 14 June
[adjourned]