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Mythbusting the ISBN
November 4, 2009 | 8:16 pm
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By Paul Biba
We’ve had some discussion on the site about ISBNs and how necessary or unnecessary they are, especially in the ebook context. It’s not a subject I know much about, but LJNDawson.com has an interesting article. On the whole she seems to be in favor of them. Her article covers the following myyths:
ISBNs are expensive
You don’t need them if your books are digital
Amazon doesn’t use them so you don’t need them
Consumers don’t search using them
You can find the full text here.
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Comments:
Obviously whether you find ISBNs cheap or not depends on your definition of cheap, and on how many you buy. I bought 1000, which cost me several thousand dollars. For a small publisher, this was a significant investment. It used to be that you couldn’t buy just one–not sure if that’s still the case.
The argument that consumers search on ISBNs because Harvard College students use them to make sure they’re getting the correct edition of a textbook doesn’t follow. Sure they’re useful for that, but how many novels come in different editions that need to be tracked?
The Amazon argument is completely weird. Sure, Amazon uses ISBNs if you give them one, but they don’t require them. So, if you’re selling through Amazon there’s no particular benefit to supplying one.
I use ISBNs. Many of the distributors I sell through require them. Before I used ISBNs, I had a problem with one of my books on Fictionwise because they already sold a different book by the same name. They do serve a purpose as a unique identifier for a book. But they’re certainly not any miracle drug.
Rob Preece
Publisher
I quote:
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So, first, some mythbusting. ISBNs are expensive.
Actually, no they are not! The new My Identifiers site will offer new pricing in January. A single ISBN will cost an author or publisher $125. Ten ISBNs are $250, or $25 per ISBN. A hundred ISBNs are $575. This is cheap!
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Actually, this is not cheap. Even this “new pricing” will be vastly more than I paid in 2000, when I purchased a block of a thousand for $600. That’s just $25 shy of a 1000 percent increase in nine years. A better question might be where all that added income is going. It certainly isn’t funding the “web pages for each ISBN,” as the writer claims. The publishers themselves fill out the data on those pages and serving those pages up online costs almost nothing.
A distinction is already made between ISBNs for books and an equivalent tracking system for magazines. Ebooks are at least as different from either as the two are from one another, so ebooks obviously need their own numbering scheme. Creating a good one, one that allows for all the differences between print and digital, would make life much easier for both publishers and consumers. Trying to fit ebooks into an aging system designed for print books in the age of mainframe computers makes as much sense as trying to cram a size-12 foot into a size-8 shoe.
Searching for my name and this topic on Teleread should turn up my suggestions for an ebook numbering scheme that’s far better than ISBNs, and I’m sure that other people can come up with something even better.
The faster we quit fussing over ISBNs and begin working on a system for ebooks, the better for everyone.
–Michael W. Perry, Seattle
Hi Michael,
Your points in the Teleread blog response to “Mythbusting the ISBN” are well-taken. I should note that as you suggested, when searching Teleread by your name and topic (“ebook numbering scheme”), despite several attempts, I could not find your suggestions or the actual material you wrote, which helps illustrate the essence of my counter-points and feedback.
The concept of creating a new ISO identification standard for e-books that enables “distinctive” identification between print and digital book products is something that continues to be debated by the standards community and others across the publishing value chain, even since 2005 before “e-books” became a commercial reality. Developing and implementing new standards at any level, and ensuring its adoption across the value chain, requires an immense investment, collaboration and consensus-building, all of which companies like Bowker and others make each and every day to ensure that the publishing value chain can operate efficiently and serve the needs of all of its stakeholders, including end-consumers.
The fact remains that the ISBN standard, which distinguishes products and format options, print and digital, still serves as the de-facto standard for identifying, digital cataloging, pinpointing discovery, facilitating trading and reporting of book products across the value chain. Systems, which vary from content management systems (CMS) and portal platforms that power the organization of retailer and publisher web sites and online catalogues, library OPAC and ILS systems, mobile phone applications, search engines, EDI-based trading/commerce systems and other electronic systems all leverage the ISBN for these purposes.
All of these systems (even “mainframe computers”) leverage databases, and those making content available in structured online environments, rely on NUMBERS to unambiguously identify products or specific items. In a search engine, retailer web site, library web site, social network application, perform a keyword search on an author, book title, or using other keywords. Many product options, hyperlinks, etc. will often appear in search results, and in most cases, results containing book items will include an ISBN number in the URL string. And even in cases where URL shorteners are used, the source URL string (derived from a database) will incorporate an ISBN number as a cataloging key. CMS and online book discovery platforms need NUMBERS and can’t pinpoint specific product options through unstructured meta-data interpretation. With many e-book format options each carrying distinguishing attributes, including and not limited to DRM, usability types, and others, ISBN numbers distinguish and unambiguously identify e-book product options. Those entities that ultimately make them available for discovery and trading need numbers to do so in digital systems. ISBNs still serve that purpose.
I would also invite and encourage you to compare the cost of ISBNs to web site URLs which you need to purchase and annually renew at costs that average $9.99-$34.99 per year. Using your 100 ISBNs for $575 example, the ISBN, which is a one-time purchase, amounts to $5.75 per number and does a lot more than a URL. Today, when you buy ISBNs from the U.S. ISBN Agency, in addition to getting your ISBNs, you get a WEB PAGE which we 1) built the system to support their delivery 2) host for you at no additional cost and 3) search optimize and 4) enable you to customize and make your title information “portable” to many other channels where consumers and book buyers can FIND the publisher’s books. Generally speaking, comparing pricing on any business product or service today or in 2010 to year 2000 isn’t a fair or reasonable argument at all. In a 10 year span, putting aside inflation, costs of doing business have increased and investments to support ISBN order automation and fulfillment are massive and continuously made, yet we’ve still lowered our prices. In most other countries, ISBNs are subsidized by government agencies; in the U.S. they are NOT.
I welcome the opportunity to learn more about your proposed “e-book numbering scheme” – perhaps you could point me to it on Teleread as a starting point, and I’d be happy to consider sharing it with those I collaborate with on international supply chain and standards levels for evaluation.
Sincerely,
Andy W.
VP Identifier Services, Bowker (US ISBN Agency)
ISBN International Agency – Board of Directors