Children's Interactive Book in Iran, A Review on Existing Situation and Production Challenges

Fahimnia, Fatima, Maghsoudinasab, Shahrzad, Noruzi, Alireza and Matlabi, Dariush Children's Interactive Book in Iran, A Review on Existing Situation and Production Challenges. Human Information Interaction, 2021, vol. 8, n. 1, pp. 42-56. [Journal article (Paginated)]

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English abstract

Background and objective: Audience communication with digital media is mutual and interactive. Non-printed digital formats of books maintain the features of interactivity. This study attempts to identify interactive children's books published in Iran and assess publishers' viewpoints on the challenges of creating interactive books. Method: This study applied a qualitative approach in three parts. The features of interactive books (published in Iran) were assessed based on a checklist and were described in three sections: producer, multimedia, and interactive features. Interviews with interactive book producers were mined from periodicals, and themes related to production challenges were identified. The experiences of interactive book producers were studied by phenomenological method to identify the production challenges. Findings: The production of interactive books in Iran started in the early 2010s and continued till the middle of the decade. Some publishers stopped production due to the lack of skills or financial resources. The production of interactive books ran into problems because of poor copyright laws, the authors' concern about co-creation, and the lack of expertise in producing interactive narrative and multimedia content. Poor and imitative content fails to compete with similar non-Iranian products in the cultural products market. Lack of sufficient theoretical foundations for digital reading and technical infrastructure to support these products were other challenges identified in the production of interactive books. Conclusion : Continuous audience recognition is one of the issues that interactive book producers have paid less attention to. In producing a good interactive story, it is necessary to pay attention to the interactive narrative and multimedia features. Many of the features of interactive narratives, such as co-creation, online writing, and audience communication, were not considered in the books reviewed, and multimedia features in many cases cause discontinuity in reading. Interactive book producers have not paid as much attention to their audience as they should. If producers do not have relevant information on their audience, they cannot fully understand the interests and needs of their audience. Under the circumstances, even if there are adequate infrastructure and appropriate financial resources, the audience would not accept the product.

Item type: Journal article (Paginated)
Keywords: Interactive books, Interactive Narration, Electronic Literature, Children's Interactive Book, Interactive Media, Children’s e-book
Subjects: H. Information sources, supports, channels. > HH. Audio-visual, Multimedia.
H. Information sources, supports, channels. > HO. e-books.
Depositing user: Dr. Alireza Noruzi
Date deposited: 17 Sep 2021 06:43
Last modified: 17 Sep 2021 06:43
URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10760/42464

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