EDRLab Members Circle

Using AI pipelines for metadata, accessibility, and distribution : dialogue with Zedoc AI

As content volumes surge and distribution requirements become more stringent, the industry needs intelligent orchestration that respects the craft of publishing.

For this Members Circle session, we’re inviting Zedoc AI to lead a strategic discussion on integrating artificial intelligence into workflows: automating tedious content conversion tasks, semantic enrichment without compromising editorial control, opportunities for AI-assisted metadata generation and structured content mapping to meet modern accessibility requirements…

Join us for an open discussion on what tools like Zedoc AI can offer, and how our industry can leverage the next automation wave to boost efficiency without sacrificing quality.

From Vision to Action: Building R&D Projects for the Digital Publishing Ecosystem

Using digital comics as one concrete example, this session will present a broader dynamic now being developed within EDRLab: making consortium-building and collaborative funding a structural lever for anticipating the technological transformations of digital publishing.

Led by Samuel Petit (Mangas.io, EDRLab), the session will outline an already proven method based on the articulation between industry, public research, and the standards community. This approach has already helped bring several projects to life, including ENACA, but its scope goes well beyond digital comics, which should be understood here as only one use case among many.

The core idea is straightforward: to enable EDRLab members to engage collectively in R&D topics that are more prospective, more ambitious, or simply too risky to pursue alone. As EDRLab grows, it becomes increasingly important to complement its highly pragmatic day-to-day actions with a collective capacity to explore future challenges, de-risk technical directions, and mobilize the right regional, national, or European funding frameworks.

This approach is fully consistent with the historical DNA of EDRLab and, before it, of the IDPF. It extends a long-standing philosophy of contributing to the technical commons of digital publishing through open standards, while recognizing that scaling such ambition now requires resources, alliances, and structured projects.

The session will also highlight an existing cooperation base between Mangas.io, La Rochelle Université, and EDRLab, which is intended to become a recurring foundation for future initiatives. More importantly, it will show that this kind of setup can inspire other members on very different topics, including adjacent or partially related ones. One does not need to lead a project to benefit from such a dynamic. In many cases, the real opportunity lies in identifying the right topic, joining the right consortium, and contributing from the right position.

More broadly, this is an invitation to view EDRLab not only as a place for pragmatic coordination around standards and interoperability, but also as a community capable of organizing itself to secure funding, launch collaborative R&D, and create shared value at ecosystem level.

We invite EDRLab members to discover this consortium-driven approach, the upcoming funding opportunities it can unlock, and the forms of collaboration it makes possible, in order to help build a more open, innovative, accessible, and technologically robust future for digital reading.

Navigating European Funding for the book sector

This session is designed as a practical roadmap for EDRLab members to navigate the various European calls for projects. It will be an open conversation exploring which funding streams best fit the diverse needs of the book industry—from digital innovation and translation to international distribution. Our goal is to ensure that every member, whether a tech provider or a traditional publisher, knows exactly where to look, what to apply for, and how to align their projects with European cultural priorities.

We will be joined by two key experts to help you navigate the EU funding landscape:

• Dag ASBJØRNSEN (Policy Officer, European Commission) will present the overarching European cultural and digital priorities. Understanding these high-level objectives is essential for aligning your projects—whether in digital publishing, tech, or research—with the EU’s long-term vision.
• Natasa ASIK (Project Adviser, EACEA) will provide a practical roadmap to specific funding programs. She will highlight relevant calls for the book sector, sharing tips on how to build a winning application.

This is an interactive session. The second half of the meeting is dedicated to a direct exchange with our guests, so please bring your ideas and specific questions regarding different funding streams.

Driving the success of the EAA across European publishing

Eight months after the European Accessibility Act came into effect, Fondazione LIA will offer a thoughtful look at the current landscape of digital publishing in Europe. Starting from the strong commitment of Italian publishers, the presentation explores how the legislation is being implemented across different countries. It aims to identify shared trends, ongoing challenges, and the first visible signs of transformation—providing valuable insights into the evolving role of the EAA in shaping accessibility within the European publishing ecosystem.

Members Circle #1 is all about W3C, EPUB and you

Exclusive to EDRLab members, this webinar will provide a focused update on ongoing W3C standards work and its implications for your digital publishing strategy, while also giving EDRLab the opportunity to collect structured feedback from members on standards related activities.

Overview

Join this members-only session for an in-depth briefing on the latest developments in W3C Publishing Maintenance WG (PMWG) activities, including work on EPUB 3.4 and related specifications. You will hear how current discussions on annotations, comics, webtoons, and accessibility are converging into concrete technical and editorial changes that will impact reading systems, production workflows, and compliance in the coming years. We will provide complementary information to TPAC2025 Progress on standards: takeaway.

What you will learn

• Current status and next steps for EPUB 3 maintenance, including clarifications, errata, and emerging features under discussion in the PMWG.
• How standardisation of annotations, precise location, bookmarks, and citations is progressing, and how it will influence user-facing features and interoperability.
• The latest thinking on better support for digital comics and scrolled content (webtoons) in EPUB, and what implementers and content producers should anticipate.
• Accessibility focus: future enhancements, including proposed semantics for extended descriptions, updated metadata display guide and crowswalk, draft guidance on Expressing Accessibility and discussions about ways to enhance fixed-layout accessibility.

Why this matters for members

• Direct insight into how EDRLab’s involvement in W3C groups translates into concrete benefits for your products, platforms, and services.
• Early signals to help you prioritise roadmap, tooling, and production changes aligned with upcoming recommendations and maintenance releases.
• A dedicated space for Q&A and open discussion where EDRLab can gather concrete feedback from members on W3C priorities, pain points, and implementation challenges, helping to better represent the community in standards work.

Practical information

This live webinar is reserved for EDRLab members and will include a presentation followed by an open discussion. Please circulate the invitation internally to your technical, product, and accessibility teams.

Resources: Presentation shown during the event.

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