Those of us in publishing and publishing services—writers, editors, designers, illustrators, compositors, coders, printers, marketing professionals, sales—are part of a long and great tradition. For centuries we have enabled people to learn, understand, share, dream, connect, and help themselves and others. Today we are challenged with carrying on this great tradition in the digital age. Along with the remarkable advances that ever-developing technology has brought to publishing and information sharing, there have also been numerous challenges. The landscape of the publishing market has changed greatly over the past 10 years; this has had an impact on not only the delivery of information, but on how information is created, managed, and re-purposed. Like all of you, we have strived to meet the needs of the market while balancing the need for accelerated schedules, staying within corporate budget constraints, meeting high quality standards, and easily accessing robust content for appropriate re-use. Some questions come up over and over again as we learn and develop new tools, refine processes, and implement efficiencies. How is the Internet broadly affecting how and what we write and how it is distributed and stored? How can editorial, creative, and technical professionals here and internationally work together in innovative ways to serve our audience? How we can maintain time-honored standards of excellence in publishing in today's changing, fast-paced, budget-driven market? WordsWise™ is nSight’s contribution to a dialogue on these and other topics. In this inaugural bi-monthly electronic newsletter we’ll have something to say about the editorial, production, design, and marketing issues for those who are creating and distributing content in the information age. We welcome your thoughts and encourage you to share them with us. In this issue, we will look at how we can plan for content re-purposing from an editorial standpoint; some effective tools for production to streamline this process; and how design and editorial teams can work efficiently to create reusable content using InCopy and InDesign as production tools. Sincerely, Elizabeth A. St. Germain VP, Publishing and Editorial Services nSight, Inc. P.S. You are receiving this newsletter because you are a valued client, partner, and/or friend of nSight. We respect your time and privacy, so if you wish to be removed from our WordsWise mailing list, simply unsubscribe. Editorial Planning for Content Repurposing Faster, Better, Cheaper...these are the words that are heard repeatedly in the development of educational material. But how can publishers meet all these parameters while maintaining high quality content and providing enriched learning experiences? Effective Use and Implementation of XML in e-Publishing Eliminate duplicated effort by writers and editors. Simplify layout and design. Reuse a single chunk of information in many ways, from print to a cell phone to a Web portal in a different language. While these goals may seem to be a publisher's wish list, they are achievable through XML. Lessons Learned from Moving to InCopy and InDesign You're on deadline. Editorial announces a major re-write to the magazine or book that you are publishing. Design needs the text in order to lay out the pages but it isn't finished being written, edited, and copy fit by editorial. What do you do? Word Origins: Where Did It Come From? Word [ME, from OE; akin to OHG wort word, L. verbim, GK. eirien to say, speak, Hitt. weriya- to call, name] noun. a unit of language, consisting of one or more spoken sounds or their written representation that functions as a principal carrier of meaning. Origin [ME origine, probably from MF, from L origin-, origo, from oriri to rise] noun. a: rise, beginning, or derivation from a source b: the point at which something begins or rises or from which it derives. William Zinsser on Punctuation "There's not much to be said about the period except that most writers don't get to it fast enough." (page 72, On Writing Well, New York: Quill (Harper Resource 2001)