KnowledgeView launches a hosted publishing service

An online news editing and publishing service designed for regional and local newspapers, Internet and newsletter publishers — at just a fraction of the cost of similar services — is being launched tomorrow (Wednesday).

RAPIDPublish.info already has its first customer, the North West Enquirer, a weekly newspaper based in Manchester.

With RAPIDPublish.info, the user can access and file news items and pictures from selected agencies and set up filters to receive up-to-the-minute reports of breaking news and running stories. The items can be opened and edited on-screen, and then forwarded to colleagues or sent directly to page make-up or to a web page online.

The service is available from just GBP32 (46 euros) a month, making it an ideal and affordable system for smaller publishing groups and newsletter producers.

RAPIDPublish.info has been designed by KnowledgeView Ltd, of London, using its hugely successful RAPID Browser software and integrating Adobe‘s latest publishing software, including InCopy and InDesign. KnowledgeView has also signed up with content providers such as PR Newswire, GNN Government News Network and CCN Matthews to provide news to subscribers immediately at no cost. Users can also subscribe to Dow Jones Newswire and Independent News and Media services. Industry RSS news feeds are also available.

Publishers can sign up to the service online at www.rapidpublish.info and begin to use it immediately using any web browser.

Roberto Minio, Technical Director at KnowledgeView, said: “For editorial efficiency, the RAPIDPublish.info platform is based on a modern concept of newsdesks for multi-channel publishing, so that journalists can easily publish to paper, web or other devices.

“KnowledgeView’s and Adobe’s support for XML tagging makes it easy for journalists to publish a developing story on several platforms. This approach, while helping to increase circulation and advertising revenues, also allows the modern publisher to have a firmer handle on the use of his own content on-line, an issue raised recently by the World Association of Newspapers’ complaint on the ‘unauthorised use’ of its content by web harvesters.”

The North West Enquirer, RAPIDPublish.info’s first customer, is a new weekly newspaper launching in May with a target circulation of 20,000. It will cover Cumbria, Lancashire, Cheshire, Merseyside and Greater Manchester.

Bob Waterhouse, the editor, said the choice of service was made after several systems were tested. RAPIDPublish.info was selected because of its powerful news content management, flexible editorial workflow, multi-publishing capabilities and low cost of ownership.

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