The Roundup: Publishing News from the Arab World
News and stories with a focus on the publishing industry, education, and
technology from across the Arab world.
ICANN Pushes for Arabic Domains as
Internet Usage Increases across Arab World
As internet usage increases across the Arab world, ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, is advocating for the creation of Arabic
domain names in order to strengthen Arabic’s online presence.
ICANN is responsible for assigning domain names and its current outreach to the Arab world is part of a
global campaign that seeks to break away
from the organization’s roots in the United States and to engage other
countries and societies with internet usage and regulation. In an interview with CNN’s program
Marketplace Middle East, ICANN President Fadi
Chehade this new campaign “will unlock the ability of many users to participate
in the internet economy.”
EBSCO Publishing Launches an Online
Arabic-Language Database
EBSCO
Publishing, an online research database, has launched an Arabic-language online
database that will feature hundreds of journals and
articles by academics from across the Arab world. Arab e-Marefa promotes itself as the
“leading source for Arabic-language full-text academic journals” and hosts 910
academic journals and reports, Masters and PhD dissertations, and over 7,000
book reviews. The database was founded by Marefa
Company for Digital Content, which claims that to be a
company “concerned with the production of Arabic digital knowledge.”
Second Conference of Arab Publishers
Association Convenes in Egypt
The Arab Publishers’ Association (APA) held a conference in Alexandria, Egypt to discuss the current
challenges facing Arab publishers. The conference, held on 23 and 24 March, featured
the title “Knowledge
Enablement and the Challenges Facing Arab Publishing” and
was attended by eleven Arab countries. According to Ahram Online, the
head of the APA, Assem Shalaby, stated that the Arab publishing world has “many
challenges, such as the random censorship imposed by some of the Arab
governments, the expensive costs and customs, in addition to the absence of a
real media that promotes and market books.” The conference also highlighted the
need to increase electronic publishing in the Arab world. Adel Khalifa, head of
the Arab Union for Electronic Publishing, stated that only 0.4 percent of global electronic publishing is in
Arabic.
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