Deborah Forte

Scholastic, the iconic publishing company has nearly 100 years of history promoting literacy to kids, but the digitization of the world over the last 20 years created some new challenges. With more and more kids turning towards digital media for their entertainment, Scholastic recognized in order to remain relevant and fulfill the company's mission, it would need to reach children where they were: on screens.

Book Business spent the last two days soaking up the publishing wisdom on display at the Digital Book World conference at the Hilton New York.

You can check out twitter, @bookbusinessmag, for the full play by play. Below are some highlights.

-Following the Children's Content in Context breakout session on Wednesday, we got to exchange a few quick words about our mutual love of the Android platform with none other than LeVar Burton, who was at the session to support Reading Rainbow CEO Asra Rasheed. "I'm a nerd," explaind Burton during the session with regard to his affinity for the Google mobile OS.

Not too long ago, just making an app made news—especially in the book world, where the utility (and desirability) of book apps was a subject of some debate. As publishers have come to see books as multimedia brands, however, the terms of the debate have shifted, from whether book apps have a place to when. Apps can accomplish many things when executed right—from content enhancement to marketing to fun and games, helping publishers meet audiences where they are and build loyalty to books, brands and authors. Realizing this, a few companies have gotten pretty sophisticated in their, ahem, app-roach, as the following examples show.

Thousands of publishing executives from the book and magazine publishing industries will convene at the New York Marriott Marquis, Times Square, March 19-21, for the Publishing Business Conference & Expo—North America’s largest conference and expo of its kind.

The conference—produced by Publishing Executive and Book Business (industry-leading business)—features more than 40 sessions and nearly 100 speakers, including: David Carey, President, Hearst Magazines; Josh Tyrangiel, Editor, Bloomberg Businessweek; Josh Quittner, Editorial Director, Flipboard; David Carr, Columnist and Reporter, The New York Times; Deborah Forte, President, Scholastic Media; Marcus Leaver, President, Sterling Publishing Co. Inc. (owned by Barnes & Noble); Michela O’Connor Abrams, President, Dwell Media (who is also the conference chair); Maureen McMahon, President/Publisher, Kaplan Publishing; Peter Meirs, VP, Production Technologies, Time Inc.; Matt Bean, AVP, Mobile, Social and Emerging Media, Rodale Inc.; and Christopher McKenzie, VP & Director, Institutional Sales, Americas & EMEA, Wiley InterScience Sales, Wiley.

From Publishers Weekly:   After more than 18 months of development, Scholastic has begun beta tests for Storia, its proprietary e-book platform for selling and distributing its trade titles as well as digital editions of titles from other children’s houses. The beta test features 1,300 titles with the vast majority published by Scholastic; Deborah Forte, [...]

Scholastic Media, a division of global children's publishing giant Scholastic Inc., has announced a two-part holiday episode of its Emmy Award-winning PBS KIDS GO! series WordGirl, "A World Without WordGirl." The episode will play off of the Jimmy Stewart classic It's a Wonderful Life.

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