GoodEReader.com has profiled several companies that are busy developing interactive app books for various color and audio supported devices that can download app-based content. The majority of these companies seem to publish a strict diet of children’s content, given that part of the full interactive experience is the all-important audio narration which many young readers still need.
TouchyBooks, hailed as the world’s leading children’s book app publisher in a recent press release, aims to serve children’s sensory and motor skills development through its featured titles, many of which are available in a host of different languages, including the newly developed Italian content; the language capabilities have allowed TouchyBooks’ apps to be downloaded in ninety different countries.
The recent news from TouchyBooks is that the newest version 2.0 will include an autoplay feature, similar to the option available with iStoryTime apps, in which children who are too young to operate the book or are limited by a developmental, mental, or physical impairment are able to fully enjoy the app without needing to be able to work a touch-screen device. The new version has also been enhanced to allow the characters to change their logic in accordance with the user’s decisions. Consumers have been complimentary of the new parental controls and updated search and page view options in the upgrade.
TouchyBooks is celebrating the release of its new version 2.0 with a first-ever online social media party via Facebook and Twitter. Opportunities to preview the new updates will allow users to interact with the upgrade, earn prizes, and receive product giveaways.
[showhide type=’pressrelease’]Pitch – TouchyBooks 2.0
TouchyBooks leads children’s digital media with 2.0 Version
TouchyBooks releases 2.0 version and reaffirms their position in the digital book revolution. Electronic books for adults as well as for children are reinventing reading to making it more up-to-date with today’s technology. Kid’s books aren’t just beautiful paper creations anymore but fantastical worlds of reading with music, narration and pictures that move. And TouchyBooks brings those stories together in an easy to use and very practical digital bookstore app.
When TouchyBooks first appeared on the iPhone and iPad platforms in October 2010 the bookstore app included 5 titles in three languages and offered children a new way to experience books and offered parents a safe and organized way to choose books. Since then the app has grown to have more than 70 titles in five languages and expects to have 200 titles by the end of 2011. This bookstore has received more than 700,000 user/parent downloads worldwide which has allowed the app to remain among the highest ranked Book apps in the AppStore. These stories can now even be found on Android, Windows Phone, and Blackberry Playbook. So what is it that makes these books such a distinct experience for children?
TouchyBooks incorporates so many characteristics that make their books stand out. Each feature is carefully studied by educators and parents to enhance a child’s experience. For example autoplay, which has been added in their latest 2.0 update, is essentially directed towards younger readers so they can listen to and view the story in order to learn how to create it themselves when the Autoplay is off by reading and touching the interactive illustrations. More about the 2.0 version can be found here.
Many of the interactive features in the books stimulate children’s intuition and motor skills. The music and sound effects engage them and make the reading more exciting and fun. Many of the books are also given a spectacular appeal with different types of animations like snow particles and drag and drop. TouchyBooks have even made it possible for a child’s decisions to actually affect the story by adding logic to the animations.
TouchyBooks publishes new books every week, they make it easy for parents to preview books and offer them at very competitive prices from $0.99 – $3.99. So, are people like Al Gore and JK Rowling investing big in this new trend? Will paper books become old fashioned? Is this the future of publishing? Schools? Education? The answers to these questions are becoming clearer every day.
To celebrate the TouchyBooks 2.0 update and all the work that has gone into it, TouchyBooks is having an App Party and anyone and everyone is cordially invited. Like any fashionable and modern company the festivities will clearly be held online on their social networks (Facebook and Twitter) where prizes and giveaways will be awarded and raffled during the first week of August. [/showhide]
Mercy Pilkington is a Senior Editor for Good e-Reader. She is also the CEO and founder of a hybrid publishing and consulting company.
