Only founded in 2011, Nosy Crow is already the multi-award-winning 16th biggest children’s books publisher in the UK (Nosy Crow, 2014a). With 3 nominations at this year’s FutureBook Innovation Awards (Tivnan, 2014), the way in which Nosy Crow aim to “actively embrace new technology” (Nosy Crow, 2014a) should be an example to many other independent publishers who may be scared to venture into the digital publishing world. In this increasingly digital age, publishers have to be more innovative in not only the way they market their books but also in their pricing and the combining of digital products with physical ones (Clark & Phillips, 2014), and Nosy Crow seem to be succeeding in these aspects.
As children and young adults turn to YouTube and game based apps for their entertainment needs, the task of getting them to see reading as something to do for pleasure opposed to a chore is not an easy one.
As children and young adults turn to YouTube and game based apps for their entertainment needs, the task of getting them to see reading as something to do for pleasure opposed to a chore is not an easy one.
Focusing on the 0-14 age range, Nosy Crow not only create a variety of apps, they also use the technology available to offer audio readings with all of their picture books (Nosy Crow, 2014b). Stories Aloud uses the voices of children with various sound effect to add another element to titles such as Dinosaur Dig! and Shifty McGifty and Slippery Sam (Nosy Crow, 2014c)
Available for iOS on iPads and iPhones, their latest app Jack and the Beanstalk offers a well balanced reading experience where winning mini-games is rewarded with keys that further unlock the story, making reading more exciting than ever (Nosy Crow, 2014d).
Available for iOS on iPads and iPhones, their latest app Jack and the Beanstalk offers a well balanced reading experience where winning mini-games is rewarded with keys that further unlock the story, making reading more exciting than ever (Nosy Crow, 2014d).
With the evident success of this still fairly new company, will other publishers follow in their footsteps and begin to create innovative apps and other ways to get children interested in reading again? Lets hope so.
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