DAISY Consortium 2007 Annual Report

Welcoming Comments from the President and Secretary General

Hiroshi Kawamura, President of the DAISY Consortium

George Kerscher, Secretary General of the DAISY Consortium

Mission and Vision

Vision

The DAISY Consortium envisions a world where people with print disabilities have equal access to information and knowledge, without delay or additional expense.

Mission

The DAISY Consortium's mission is to develop and promote international standards and technologies which enable equal access to information and knowledge by all people with print disabilities and which also benefit the wider community.

DAISY: More than Accessible

DAISY content is not the only accessible reading format, but it is the only accessible format that provides an enhanced, rich multimedia reading experience. Activities in 2007 strategically positioned the DAISY Standard, increasing the momentum which has made DAISY the number one accessible reading format worldwide and which will bring DAISY to the mainstream.

Highlights: Standards

Requirements Gathering for Next DAISY Standard

The DAISY Standard has been updated and revised on an ongoing basis. However rapid changes in technology, increases in potential user groups for DAISY content, creation and provision, and, potential mainstream applications alerted the DAISY Consortium to the need for a thorough review of the Standard. The DAISY Consortium began a coordinated process to ensure that the DAISY Standard (officially the ANSI/NISO Z39.86, Specifications for the Digital Talking Book) meets and would continue to meet the many needs of the various user groups.

Following extensive planning and preparation, the requirements gathering process for the next DAISY Standard was launched October 31, 2007. Illustrating the DAISY Consortium's commitment to promotion and participation in standards harmonization, the requirements gathering processes was open to all interested parties. An area of the DAISY Web site was developed to provide direction for requirement submission and support online requirements gathering. All submissions were reviewed and then made available on the site for public comment.

To remain viable and vital the Standard must continue to evolve, making the DAISY Standard the benchmark for content that is both accessible and provides a feature-rich reading experience. Submission of requirements will remain open following the five month requirements gathering process. All submissions and comments remain on the DAISY Web site in the Standards area.

DAISY "Inside" IDPF's Open Publication Structure Specification

In September the International Digital Publishing Forum (IDPF) elevated the Open Publication Structure (OPS 2.0) to a recommended specification, making it an official IDPF industry standard. IDPF is "a trade and standards organization dedicated to the development and promotion of electronic publishing." (reference the IDPF Web site).

The DAISY 3 XML element set (DTBook) and the DAISY navigation model are incorporated into the IDPF specification. Section 2.4: DTBook Preferred Vocabulary of the OPS specification references the DAISY Standard extensively and points to the DAISY Web site. Publishers producing DTBook OPS Publications are directed to use the DAISY Structure Guidelines.

The OPS specification with "DAISY inside" is a commercial industry standard for representing the content of electronic publications. This is an important step toward increasing awareness of the DAISY Standard in the electronic commercial publishing sector. It is a step toward bringing DAISY to mainstream electronic publishing. George Kerscher, Secretary General of the DAISY Consortium was elected to the IDPF Board of Directors in January 2007.

MathML Modular Extension Approved

The MathML in DAISY modular extension to the DAISY 3 Standard, developed in accordance with the modular extension guidelines, was approved by the DAISY Board at the Board meeting in February 2007.

MathML is a W3C XML application developed with accessibility to mathematics as a primary goal. The MathML extension enables full support for accessible mathematics in the DAISY Standard.

Several members of the MathML in DAISY Working Group were present at the 2007 CSUN Conference, making sure that everyone heard the good news: MathML was approved as an official modular extension of the DAISY Standard. Mathematics and sciences are integral to all study and research fields; the approval of this extension makes the production of accessible mathematics possible.

DAISY Structure Guidelines: Revised and Available for Review

A major revision of the DAISY Structure Guidelines, including extensive markup examples accompanied by corresponding print page images, was made available for official review in November 2007. This revision is the result of the collaborative efforts of the DAISY Consortium, CAST, Inc., and gh LLC. The published 2008 DAISY Structure Guidelines are available on the DAISY Web site.

Highlights: Projects

Microsoft "Save As DAISY XML": Collaborative Open Source Development

On November 13, 2007, Microsoft Corp. and the DAISY Consortium announced a collaborative open source development project that is a major breakthrough, bringing DAISY feature-rich, structured information to the millions of people worldwide who are unable to read print due to a visual, physical, perceptual, developmental, cognitive, or learning disability. The outcome of this collaboration which includes Sonata Software Ltd. is "Save As DAISY XML", a free, downloadable add-in for Microsoft Word that will translate Microsoft Office Open XML text files into DAISY XML (technically referred to as DTBook). DAISY XML is the foundation of the globally accepted DAISY Standard for reading and publishing navigable, rich media content.

The source code for "Save As DAISY XML" will be freely available for Friends and Members of the DAISY Consortium and other developers to implement in their publishing and content creation tools and systems.

The impact of "Save As DAISY XML"

For those who use accessible reading materials, "Save As DAISY XML" means that the quantity and availability of DAISY content will increase many-fold. For organizations producing and distributing DAISY content, "Save As DAISY XML" should improve efficiencies and reduce costs. For publishers around the world it will provide a way to add navigable, feature-rich DAISY formatted publications to their range of product options.

The DAISY XML file can be processed to create multiple accessible formats, including fully-navigable, feature-rich DAISY books, e-Books, and large print, using tools available from DAISY Friends, the DAISY Consortium and other DAISY tool developers. Information about these products is available in the Tools area of the DAISY Consortium Web site.

Details about the "Save As DAISY XML" project are available on the DAISY Web site.

DAISY Pipeline

The DAISY Pipeline is a suite of transformation tools developed to meet the production and conversion needs of organizations and companies creating and distributing DAISY content. In June 2007 the First Official Release of the DAISY Pipeline was made available. This joint release included the Pipeline Core and the Pipeline cross-platform GUI.

The DAISY Pipeline is an open source framework for document and DTB-related transformations which provides a cross-platform, customizable and extensible framework for document- and DTB-related transformations. It is available under LGPL (GNU Lesser General Public License) to any organization, commercial company or individual at no cost. The first release of the DAISY Pipeline was targeted primarily to production environments.

In the latter half of 2007 two new release candidates of the DAISY Pipeline were made available. Development continues and the release planned for early 2008 will support the transformation of DAISY XML files from "Save As DAISY XML" to a variety of output formats including DAISY 2.02 and DAISY 3.

The DAISY Consortium thanks the RNIB and the Norwegian Library of Talking Books and Braille (NLB), for their support of the DAISY Pipeline Project.

Online Delivery Project

The DAISY community requires a non-proprietary protocol that is standardized across international and library boundaries for the online delivery of DAISY content. It must be customizable by libraries for implementation in the service models currently being used and as well as those yet to be defined. The purpose of the Online Delivery Project is to develop a protocol that homogenizes online delivery of DAISY content. Peter Osborne of the RNIB is the project lead for the DAISY Online Delivery Project.

In June 2007 representatives from more than fourteen organizations and companies participated in the first meeting held June in Toronto, Canada. The outcomes of this meeting set the stage for the Working Group focus, activities and developments, including the identification of:

• What was in scope or not in scope
• Key dependencies with other project areas
• Project deliverables
• Three sample implementations
• A technical subgroup, and subgroup lead
• A use cases/user stories subgroup

The second meeting was held in conjunction with the Techshare Conference in October, enabling an even greater number of representatives to attend. It was determined that the protocol must be sufficiently extensible to support the implementation of future technological developments. It was further decided that the project should be accelerated. Weekly rather than monthly conference calls of the Technical Subgroup were set.

With test implementations established and work continuing on the schema, the DAISY Online Project is moving forward to enable standard online delivery of DAISY content.

The DAISY Consortium thanks the RNIB for its support of the DAISY Online Project.

The Urakawa Project

The Urakawa Project is a collaborative development project operating under the umbrella of the DAISY Consortium. In 2007, the Urakawa Project team worked to develop the DAISY Software Development Toolkit (SDK), and Obi, an audio-based DAISY 3 authoring tool. The initial design work for Tobi, a text-based DAISY 3 multimedia authoring tool was begun. All software developed by this project is open source and will be made available to everyone at no cost. Both Obi and Tobi provide a modular and extensible framework to facilitate commercial uptake, including the development of plug-ins and customizations for the commercial market. Both will be released under a business-friendly licensing scheme (LGPL) that encourages commercial development.

SDK (Software Development Toolkit)

The DAISY SDK is a Software Development Kit which can be used to build complex multimedia authoring applications. It is modular and can be extended. During 2007 the development team worked toward the first official public release of the DAISY SDK: SDK 1.0 beta, to be delivered in early 2008. The SDK is the "core" application of the Urakawa Project development.

Obi

Obi is a simple, baseline DAISY 3 Digital Talking Book production tool. It was developed initially to demonstrate the capabilities of the DAISY SDK but it has evolved into a powerful audio-based DAISY authoring tool, which is easy to use, accessible and can be internationalized. Obi produces DAISY 3 content with audio and structure.

In April 2007 Obi version 0.84 was released for review, testing and feedback. Some of the features in Obi 0.84 include:

• Completely accessible GUI (user interface)
• Improvements in undo and redo
• Support for essential metadata
• Updated online user manual

The first full release of Obi is scheduled for the first half of 2008.

Tobi

Following a directive from the Board of the DAISY Consortium planning for a text-based DAISY 3 production tool began in earnest. Tobi development is in the inception stage, with formal requirements gathering in progress in order to produce a prioritized hierarchy of requirements, a series of user-interface mockups and GUI prototypes.

A second parallel Tobi development is also underway to write the formal specifications for Tobi's modular and extensible application framework to support the external development of plug-ins and customizations.

Tobi, like Obi, relies on the DAISY SDK. Beta releases are planned for the second half of 2008.

The DAISY Consortium thanks the RNIB for its support of Tobi development.

DAISY OK

The purpose of the DAISY OK Project is to encourage both reading system (DAISY player) developers and DAISY book producers to create products that provide an enhanced, rich multimedia reading experience. In support of this, during the last half of 2007, the process of gathering a wide variety of DAISY sample content was begun.

ZedVal

Two new ZedVal release candidates were made available in 2007 (2.0 RC3 and 2.0 RC4). ZedVal is the DAISY 3 open source validation tool developed and maintained by the DAISY Consortium.

Highlights: Membership

"The generously discounted Associate membership fee structure for organizations in developing countries – approved by the DAISY Board of Directors in 2006 – continues to promote membership in the DAISY Consortium for organizations which previously may have been unable to join. This fee structure, based on the World Bank classifications, demonstrates the Consortium's commitment to bringing the enhanced, rich multimedia reading experience of DAISY to everyone, and to encourage global participation in the developmental work and mission of the Consortium.

New Members, Friends and Supporters of DAISY

To bring the list of new Members and Friends provided in the Annual Report in line with the DAISY Consortium Financial Report, the new membership of organizations, companies, institutes and individuals will be reported for the period April 1 to March 31. For the 2007 Annual Report only, the list also includes those who joined between January 1, 2008 and March 31, 2008, as they will not be included in the 2008 Annual Report under the new time frame for reporting this information. Therefore the lists provided in the DAISY 2007 Annual Report cover the period from January 1, 2007 to March 31, 2008.

New Associate Members

• Acessibilidade Brasil
• Albania Blind Association
• Christian Blind Mission International (Australia)
• Croatian Library for the Blind
• DAISY Forum of Pakistan
• State Educational Grant and Loan Scheme Agency - Office for Special Educational Assistance
• National Braille Production, St. Joseph's School for the Visually Impaired
• Open University (moved from the Publisher, Educator and Advocate category to Associate Member in early 2008)
• Bibliotheca Alexandrina (Library of Alexandria)
• China Braille Press

New Friends and Developers in 2007

• Bones Ltd.
• Exegenix Canada Inc.
• SERPRO
• Google Inc.

New Publishers, Educators and Advocates

• Open University

New Individual Supporters

• Ian Kelly
• Malgorzata van Leeuwen
• Lynn Leith

The DAISY Consortium Board of Directors, staff members and all of the DAISY Members, Friends and Supporters extend a warm welcome to each of these organizations, companies, institutes and individuals.

Highlights: Communications

There was a great deal of activity revolving around information and communications in 2007. Not the least of these activities was the rebirth of a DAISY newsletter, the completely new, monthly, DAISY Planet. First published in August of 2007, the design of the DAISY Planet "replicates" a print newspaper, including "Letter from the Editor", regular monthly columns and feature articles that bring up-to-date information on developments and activities within the DAISY community and related areas to DAISY Planet readers worldwide.

Along with the DAISY Planet the DAISY Marketplace was introduced. New and updated tools from DAISY Friends and Members and the DAISY Consortium are featured monthly in the DAISY Planet and on the DAISY Web site.

The DAISY Marketplace was introduced to feature new and updated tools and services from DAISY Friends, Members and the DAISY Consortium. The DAISY Marketplace is updated monthly in the DAISY Planet and on the DAISY Web site home page.

Other 2007 highlights included:

* Publication of the article "Inside DAISY" in the Spring issue of the ISTC Journal, "Communicator". The Institute of Scientific and Technical Communicators is a UK-based non-profit organization whose mission is "To set and improve standards for communication of the scientific and technical information supporting products, services and business."

*The article "First Step in Adding Accessibility to Google Books - Was It Enough?" was published in July. It opens with: "On July 3, 2007, Google quietly made what may seem to be a subtle change to Google Books. However, individuals who are blind or have a print disability are going to be both very excited and disappointed. For them it is not a "subtle" change. A very special hidden link was added to the Google Books in the "full view", which is exposed to Assistive Technology (AT) such as screen readers used by people who are blind or have a visual impairment."

*The DAISY Web sit migrated from TPB to a new host, Bluehost in September.

*The development of a formal communications strategy for the DAISY Consortium was initiated and set the foundation to move forward with further initiatives.

*The Contact Us form on the DAISY Web site which was introduced in 2006 was extremely well used by people from around the globe, reinforcing the interest in DAISY and the need for accessible, navigable DAISY content.

*An RSS feed (Really Simple Syndication) was added for news articles published on the DAISY Web site.

*"A Better Way to Read – A Better Way to Publish" the "headline" on the DAISY Web site was changed to "The Best Way to Read – The Best Way to Publish" in October.

The DAISY Web site is an excellent source of information for both the DAISY "novice" and those who are well versed in the DAISY Standard and DAISY developments and who wish to remain current with DAISY and DAISY related activities. One of the future major enhancements planned for the DAISY Web site is online application for membership in the DAISY Consortium. Improvements, content updates and enhancements are ongoing.

Highlights: DAISY For All (DFA)

All DAISY For All Project activities are generously funded by the Nippon Foundation.

Additional DFA focal points were established in Asian developing countries, International Trainers Training seminars for DAISY Production were conducted, and AMIS 3, the DAISY Consortium's open source DAISY player is planned for released in June 2008.

Focal Point Establishment Activities

DAISY seminars, training course and follow-up course were held, to establish coordinated national implementation of DAISY in each country.

• Focal Point Training - Manila, Philippines
  March 26 - 31
• DFA Refresher Course - Islamabad, Pakistan
  April 18 - 21
• Focal Point Evaluation - Kathmandu, Nepal
  July 1 - 2
• Focal Point Evaluation - Colombo, Sri Lanka
  August 15 - 18
• DAISY Seminar in Philippines in Manila, Philippines
  September 5
• DFA Introductory Seminar - Almaty, Kazakhstan
  December 12 - 14
• Follow up training for the Engineers - Republican Library for the Blind and Visual Impaired Citizens, Almaty, Kazakhstan
  December 13 - 14

International Trainers' Training Activities

The purpose of this training program is to provide in-depth training for those who will become a qualified trainer within their respective country and provide support in neighboring countries. Each Focal Point may send at least one core technical staff member to these training programs.

• Bangkok, Thailand
  July 2 - 8

Open Source Development Activities

Local language implementation for DAISY playback tools and production is a key to successful implementation in developing countries. DFA has therefore focused on language localization for DAISY playback and production software tools.

AMIS Development Activities

• AMIS Localization Workshop - Bangkok, Thailand
  May 2 - 5
• AMIS 2.6 was released
  May
• Work Session on AMIS 3 at CWI - Amsterdam, Netherlands
  June 15, 18 - 19, and September 24 - 27
• AMIS presentation - DAISY Techshare Conference
  October 4 - 5

Other DFA Open Source Development Activities

• Urakawa Project Meetings:
  - Phuket, Thailand, January 3
  - Copenhagen, Denmark, August 8 - 12
  - London, UK, October 3
• SYMM WG Face-to-Face Meeting - Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
  January 29 - 30
• SMIL Meetings:
  - Gijon, Spain, May 9 - 10
  - Amsterdam, Netherlands, September 20 - 21
  - Boston, US, November 5 - 6
• Tobi development meeting - Copenhagen, Denmark
  August 7 - 11
• Obi Work Session - Tokyo, Japan
  November 26 - 30

Other DFA Activities

DFA activities were supplemented by additional efforts to tackle the global issues including disaster preparedness for persons with disabilities in developing countries through the development and dissemination of accessible information.

• International Conference on Tsunami Preparedness for Persons with Disabilities
  Phuket, Thailand, January 11 - 12
• Participation in 1st G3ict Global Forum
  UN Headquarters, New York, USA, March 26
• Participation in Special Event on Convention on Rights of Persons with Disabilities organized by the Human Rights Council
  Geneva, Switzerland, March 26
• Participation in the 7th InfoPoverty World Conference
  New York, USA, April 19 - 20
• Workshop: "Accessibility Standards Development and UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities" presented at the WSIS Internet Governance Forum
  Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, November 12

Highlights: Events

The DAISY Consortium is represented each year at conferences and events identified as strategic in relation to technical developments, communications and, or, Member support. DFA activities which are identified in "Highlights: DAISY For All (DFA)" are not repeated here.

• ATIA 2007 Conference and Exhibition
  January 24 - 27, Orlando, Florida
• CSUN 2007
  March 19 - 24, Los Angeles, California, USA
• DAISY General Meeting
  May 3, 2007, Melbourne Australia
• Round Table on Information Access for People with Print Disabilities
  May 5 - 8, Adelaide, South Australia
• DAISY Forum and Consultation
  June 20 - 21, Athens, Greece
• Association on Higher Education and Disability (AHEAD) Conference 2007
  July 17 - 21, Charlotte, North Carolina, USA
• IFLA 2007 Libraries for the Blind section Pre-Conference
  August 14 - 15, Grahamstown, Cape, South Africa
• DAISY Online Meetings
  June 4 - 6, Toronto, Canada
  October 3, London, UK
• DAISY Technical Conference and Techshare 2007
  October 4 - 5, London, UK
  A DAISY Technical Conference was held in London in conjunction with the 2007 Techshare Conference.
• Extraordinary DAISY General Meeting
  October 8, London, UK
  This exceptional General Meeting was called in accordance with the Articles of Association of the DAISY Consortium to enable the election of a new President. Elsebeth Tank, the President for more than four years, with a strong commitment and dedication to DAISY, stepped down as a result of a career change.
• Reaching Higher Ground conference
  November 8 - 9, Boulder Colorado, USA
• Towards Talking Book Digitization in Latin America
  November 29 - 30, Bogota D.C., Colombia

Details and information about many of these DAISY and DAISY-related conferences and events held in 2007 are provided in "Past Events" on the DAISY Web site

DAISY Board Meetings in 2007

The DAISY Board of Directors is the decision-making body of the Consortium, setting its future directions, priorities and strategies. Three DAISY Board meetings are held each year. In 2007, they were held in:

• Hamburg Germany, February 22 and 23
• Auckland, New Zealand, April 30 - May 1
• London, England October 8 - 9

Future Projects and Developments

Completion and Release of Microsoft "Save As DAISY XML"

The release of Microsoft "Save As DAISY XML" is set for early May 2008. Announced in November 2007, this add-in for Microsoft Office Word transforms OOXML into DAISY XML, thereby enabling the production of DAISY feature-rich, structured information for millions of people worldwide. This collaborative effort is an open source project, as are all DAISY Consortium software development projects.

Additional information about the "Save As DAISY XML" project is provided on the DAISY Web site.

Global Library Initiative

The DAISY Consortium in partnership with IFLA/LBS (International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, Libraries for the Blind Section) will re-examine the "Global Library" project and resume their collaborative efforts on this initiative. Key issues include international exchange of accessible content including DAISY books and establishment of a search mechanism for accessible materials available around the world.

"DAISY Next": The Evolution of the Standard

Following the technical directions review and open requirements gathering process for the DAISY Standard, work will begin to determine how the Standard should evolve in order to remain the benchmark for content that is both accessible and provides a feature-rich reading experience.

DAISY Consortium Tool Development

Years of development will culminate in the release of the DAISY player, AMIS 3, in 2008.

The release of Obi, the audio-based DAISY 3 authoring tool is also planned for 2008.

The next release of the DAISY Pipeline is scheduled for the last quarter of 2008. This release will support the creation of DAISY 3 books using the DAISY MathML extension. Work on the DAISY "Pipeline Online" Project is due to begin in May 2008, with the tool scheduled to be available late in the year.

Tobi, the DAISY Consortium's text-based authoring tool, is projected to be a 2.5 year project. Prototyping and design of Tobi will form the initial development stages with additional public deliverables planned for the duration of the development.

DAISY Online Delivery Project

The standards-based protocol for online delivery of DAISY content is scheduled for completion in 2008. The protocol will support the online delivery of DAISY content from organizations providing accessible library services to those they serve. It will be flexible and configurable in order to interface with a wide variety of server and operational configurations.

2008 DAISY Structure Guidelines

The revamped DAISY Structure Guidelines will be published on the DAISY Web site. In addition to the extensive markup examples for DAISY content, examples for NIMAS (National Instructional Materials Accessibility Standard for the US) markup are also included.

Communications: Continued Improvements

DAISY Web site improvements and enhanced communications vehicles such as Forums are planned for the near future. Podcasts and a DAISY Wiki are also under evaluation.

DAISY Consortium Strategic Plan and Road Map

Extensive work has gone into the development of a new Strategic Plan for the DAISY Consortium. Both the DAISY Board Members and staff team have contributed to the process. A new four year Strategic Plan for the DAISY Consortium will be developed and submitted to the Board of Directors for approval.

The DAISY Consortium and the world of technology continue to move forward at an unprecedented rate. The DAISY "Road Map" will be redeveloped to support the work of the DAISY Consortium and the evolution of the DAISY Standard in the years ahead.

Participation Around the Globe

Some of organizations with which the DAISY Consortium is affiliated are:

• IFLA/LBS (International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, Libraries for the Blind Section)
• WBU (World Blind Union)
• W3C (World Wide Web Consortium)
• WAI (Web Accessibility Initiative)
• IDPF (International Digital Publishing Forum)
• WSIS (World Summit on the Information Society)
• EUAIN (European Accessible Information Network)

The DAISY Consortium continues to remain viable in the standards and accessibility arenas in part through its ongoing involvement with like-minded organizations and institutions. Working together it will be possible to bring DAISY into the mainstream, to make all publications accessible to everyone.

In just over a decade the concept which began as a young man's dream of truly accessible books that could be read and used as easily as a print book is used by a sighted person, has become the most widely adopted access technology for reading in the world. DAISY is for everyone who needs accessible information and for everyone who loves to read.

DAISY Consortium Board of Directors

	Elsebeth Tank (outgoing President) Danish Library of Talking Books and Braille, DBB		Hiroshi Kawamura (incoming President) Japanese DAISY Consortium, JDC
	Bernhard Heinser (Treasurer) Swiss DAISY Consortium	John Churchill Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic, RFB&D	Elke Dittmer Media Association for Blind and Vision Impaired People, MediBuS
	Tim Evans Australia New Zealand Accessible Information Group, ANZAIG	Kjell Hansson Swedish DAISY Consortium	Stephen King Royal National Institute of Blind People, RNIB
	Arne Kyrkjebø Norwegian DAISY Consortium	Francisco Martínez Calvo Spanish National Organisation of the Blind, ONCE	Margaret McGrory Canadian DAISY Consortium
	Maarten Verboom Dedicon - Accessible information for People with a Print Impairment (Netherlands)	Keun Hae Youk Korean Braille Library, KBL

Closing Thoughts from Hiroshi Kawamura, President of the DAISY Consortium

The most recent international development in access to information and knowledge will have an impact on the long term strategy of the DAISY Consortium. On May 3, 2008, the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities entered into force. All United Nations Agencies including UNESCO, ITU (International Telecommunication Union), WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization), etc. have a mandate to implement the Convention. Governments, industries and Civil Society are also urged to implement the convention.

This will result in a dramatic change in the role of the DAISY Consortium as an internationally responsible organization which maintains accessible multimedia standards. The challenges we are going to tackle should include technological innovation to meet the diversity of accessible information requirements of persons with print disabilities, and social development which enables all communities around the world to provide reading materials in DAISY format.

The ITU World Telecommunication and Information Society Award was presented to the DAISY Consortium on May 15, 2008 in recognition of our "contribution towards building an inclusive and more equitable Information Society". Encouraged by the prestigious international recognition that this award brings, I believe that the DAISY Consortium Members, Friends, Supporters and employees will continue to strive for DAISY for Everyone, Everywhere.