A Norwegian Publishing House, Horn Forlag AS, hired Erik Thorsen's web workshop, Webverksted.no, in order to optimize the online delivery of its outstanding publications.

For years, the Joomla! content management system was doing a great job at handling paper publications over to the web audiences. There is a solid component for Joomla!, called Flipping Book, that takes JPG image files and converts them throughout an Adobe Flash script into an ebook that you can flip, as the name is telling us.

But the client was looking for more exposure, more usability and a simple way to just upload a PDF file to some server and have the new ebook distributed on the web. At this point, we opened an account at Issuu.com to do the preliminary test runs. After the fourteen days trial period, we considered that the Issuu.com web publishing service is worth the monthly payment of $19. For that money, you get rid of the sidebar advertising and --most importantly-- you can customize the looks of your presentation, this before embedding it into your own web site. Yes, creating custom Issuu themes and embedding them into your own site makes this publishing service so much more interesting and attractive for the print industry as well as for anyone producing and sharing documents of value.

You have 15GB storage space, and the maximum upload per document is 500 pages and 100MB.

Techcrunch wrote that "Issuu is a PDF viewer that doesn't suck!" Plus there are millions of Issuu users out there. It runs inside browsers, so that your documents are readable from mobile devices, iPads or Droid tables, laptops, desktops, actually from any device capable to run a web browser. You can upload any PDF, PowerPoint or Word-document. Consider subscribing for the free Issuu account to see if you like the service. It is possible that this will fulfill your expectations. But in the case you're gonna need the PRO Issuu services, with custom designed themes, with integration of Issuu published documents into your own site, with any other features that your mind, or your boss, may come up with, then it's a good idea to drop us a line.

Based on our one year long experience, along with excellent results and client satisfaction, we are offering reseller services on Issuu.com -- on a project or hourly base.

If you are in Europe then contact Erik Thorsen. If in the States then contact Faye Robinson.

Here are some examples of customized themes embedded into the client's site:

http://www.norwayonline.no/ebooks

http://www.hornforlag.no/books/destination-norway/

http://www.hornforlag.no/books/defence-and-security/