DALLAS—Exhibitors and attendees at this week's National Newspaper Association Nexpo 05 conference in Dallas were focused on efficient management of content, use of digital archiving systems, and how to design new media with the reader in mind.

The conference also had a prominent online focus. As one attendee (who asked that we not use her name) noted, "We're facing the challenge of understanding that we need to be able to present our content to readers in the form they desire. That may not necessarily be the form we're most comfortable with as newspaper publishers, but it is a demand in the marketplace that is going to continue to grow."

MerlinOne Inc., a digital asset management solutions provider, introduced its LiveEdition online newspaper edition service. LiveEdition builds on Merlin's E-Sheets, a hosted service for electronic tear sheets and invoices and archival technology.

News companies grapple with digital asset management. Click here to read more.

With LiveEdition, newspapers are available to subscribers online, and the application uses the same PDF pages and infrastructure system that the E-Sheets system does. Because LiveEdition is a hosted solution, newspapers pay for the service and do not have to purchase additional hardware or software.

Paul Holusha, director of business management for Quincy, Mass.-based MerlinOne, said, "The key differentiator in our system is that the reader can choose and pick what sections they want to read." And because it's all PDF-driven and based in Acrobat, Holusha sees it as a long-term solution for newspapers that want to offer readers the choice of perusing online news in a newspaper-style format.

"What we are doing with this solution is lowering the barrier to initial entry for the newspapers and their readers. Because of the ease of implementation and the low cost of using our system, we're gaining a foothold in this new arena and we're building on it," said Holusha.

Also at Nexpo

In other news, Mindset Software Inc. introduced its Live Pagination application for advanced layout and pagination. The application encompasses features such as Cross Pagination, which gives publishers the ability to centralize ad databases so that all company publications can paginate ads from one source, said Patrick Tully, president of the Sacramento, Calif.-based Mindset.

Newspaper group touts BluMunKee for image correction. Click here to read more.

Burlington, Mass.-based Mediaspectrum Inc., a provider of Web-based applications for media and publishing, also announced its ability to offer its publishing solution on IBM WebSphere software as part of the packaged solution offerings.