mickthompson
Junior Member
Posts: 44
Joined: Mar 15, 2014 19:19:45 GMT -8
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Post by mickthompson on Jan 9, 2015 16:31:22 GMT -8
Good point, Chelsfield.
I suspect Smashwords is listed as the publisher and our works are classed similarly to an article in a magazine that has its own classification number. Whatever, I am happy with Smashwords for providing the number without charge especially as they're distributing my little volume as a free book.
Nevertheless, the idea of buying ten ISBN numbers sounds sensible in the long run. You could always give them to relatives as birthday and Christmas presents.
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vincentberg
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Post by vincentberg on Feb 7, 2015 7:49:37 GMT -8
The secret to getting private ISBNs cheaply is to buy in bulk. Since I publish separate files to smashwords, Amazon, Createspace and now, Google Books and iBooks, I need several ISBNs for each book I publish. If you don't think you'll publish that many books (I'm about to publish my 10th soon), a better option is to find several other authors and form your own collective. By joining together and forming your own publishing group, you'll draw attention to each others works while still focusing attention on your own books. Plus, you can get the ISBNs you require for a nominal fee. (I believe it's $5.75 if you purchase 100). Don't quote me on the price, though, as I bought mine some time ago. I am a bit confused here. I assumed that, even though the ISBN for the first book in our series was assigned by Smashwords, it was portable. Essentially, I could use this ISBN when uploading to Amazon etc. Or else what is the use of a number unique to that title? If I saw that one title had a number of ISBNs attached to it, I would assume that the additional ones signified revised version, new versions of the title. Are online retailers requiring ISBNs unique to their sites? I must have missed the memo.... Sorry for not responding sooner, Chelsfield, but your assumptions are completely wrong. An ISBN is valid for each published entity. Thus if you published on smashwords, and smashwords sent the book to Barnes and Noble, the ISBN would be valid. But if you post separately to Amazon (since they won't accept books from smashwords) then you need a completely new ISBN. I post to several sites separately: smashwords, amazon, createspace and apple (I post separately to Apple because I like what Apple allows you to do with books, but Apple's book sales have been dropping recently). I also tried publishing to Google, but that was a waste of time as Google offers no way to find or display new book offerings. However, getting back on topic, each of those requires a separate ISBN. You also need a new ISBN is you republish an existing work. Thus if I revise a book or decide the old name didn't work, or even if I release an 'expanded' version of the same story, each would require a new ISBN as they're technically separate versions of the same book.
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Post by Julie Harris on Feb 7, 2015 18:50:00 GMT -8
Isbn not needed for Apple or Barnes and noble, or Kobo. Amazon gives each book an asin. They don't deal with isbn. Createspace provides a free isbn. Also Smashwords isbns are only available to US authors, unless that's changed recently.
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chelsfield
SWF Writers
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Joined: Mar 28, 2012 3:07:24 GMT -8
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Post by chelsfield on Feb 9, 2015 1:57:08 GMT -8
Isbn not needed for Apple or Barnes and noble, or Kobo. Amazon gives each book an asin. They don't deal with isbn. Createspace provides a free isbn. Also Smashwords isbns are only available to US authors, unless that's changed recently. Although American, I am publishing from the UK and am able to procure an isbn through SW. Regarding multiple isbns for the exact same book, this seems chaotic to me. Either this is a place in the system that is a bit messy with electronic publications or Julie is right, there really is no need.
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chelsfield
SWF Writers
Posts: 700
Joined: Mar 28, 2012 3:07:24 GMT -8
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Post by chelsfield on Feb 9, 2015 2:10:38 GMT -8
Isbn not needed for Apple or Barnes and noble, or Kobo. Amazon gives each book an asin. They don't deal with isbn. Createspace provides a free isbn. Also Smashwords isbns are only available to US authors, unless that's changed recently. Although American, I am publishing from the UK and am able to procure an isbn through SW. Regarding multiple isbns for the exact same book, this seems chaotic to me. Either this is a place in the system that is a bit messy with electronic publications or Julie is right, there really is no need. As is the way with digital publications, everyone is right! See the ISBN International website. But I was the most right--it's chaos!
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vincentberg
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Joined: Nov 13, 2013 13:20:51 GMT -8
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Post by vincentberg on Feb 9, 2015 21:16:14 GMT -8
Actually, an ISBN IS required for Apple, B&N, Noble and Kobo, but they're fine with free one which SW offers (if there's no ISBN, you can't distribute your book to the other sales outlets via the Premium channel). I misspoke before, when I specified that Amazon needs a separate one. Amazon is the exception, which doesn't use ISBNs, preferring their own indexing number. However, if you use your own ISBNs, then you can publish on Amazon using a unique ISBN (just as the traditional publishers do).
In my own case, I prefer purchasing my own ISBNs from Bowker so that the Publisher will be listed as me (as opposed to SW, CS and others). But more importantly, I had trouble getting books listed on Goodreads in order to do pre-release giveaways (to generate advance reviews). With no ISBN until the book is published, they can't find the book. And even if I offer the book on 'pre-release', it often took 6 weeks or longer before they're recognize a SW ISBN.
By using my own ISBNs, I can assign them well in advance, so that as soon as I offer my book, every outlet will have a complete description of it.
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Post by Julie Harris on Feb 10, 2015 1:04:40 GMT -8
I use Draft 2 Digital for distribution to Apple, nook, kobo, scribd and page foundry and have never needed to provide an isbn except for print editions via createspace.
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Ria Stone
SWF Writers
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Joined: Oct 30, 2013 14:12:26 GMT -8
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Post by Ria Stone on Feb 11, 2015 13:41:42 GMT -8
Actually, suggesting you go the extra yardage, I published using assigned ISBNs for a long time but finally decided to purchase my own. If you buy them one at a time, they've very expensive, but having the ISBN point to your own books is worthwhile. But, more importantly, I tried listing my books on goodreads.com. Since goodreads accesses their book information via iSBNs, it took close to two months before I could list any of my smashwords books. By purchasing my own and filling in the information ahead of time, the book's information is available as soon as you publish (or even before, if you want to launch a pre-release giveaway). The secret to getting private ISBNs cheaply is to buy in bulk. Since I publish separate files to smashwords, Amazon, Createspace and now, Google Books and iBooks, I need several ISBNs for each book I publish. If you don't think you'll publish that many books (I'm about to publish my 10th soon), a better option is to find several other authors and form your own collective. By joining together and forming your own publishing group, you'll draw attention to each others works while still focusing attention on your own books. Plus, you can get the ISBNs you require for a nominal fee. (I believe it's $5.75 if you purchase 100). Don't quote me on the price, though, as I bought mine some time ago. Hi Vincent: Hi, not sure I ever said hello. Do I understand correctly, you use separate ISBN numbers for the same book when posted on different sites? So, the same book could have multiple ISBN numbers? Hmmm. I have only published three "books" so far and each has their own ISBN number no matter where they are listed. Anyway, glad to know more about ISBN numbers.
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vincentberg
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Post by vincentberg on Feb 13, 2015 14:47:44 GMT -8
CanaryPress, not necessarily. If you publish via SW, and use their free ISBN, then you're set, as they distribute one distinct 'book' to multiple sites. However, if you publish through different sources (say SW, D2D, Createspace and Amazon), then each is considered a separate 'book', and would need a distinct ISBN (except for Amazon, which doesn't use ISBNs--but you can use one if you already have one). Now each of those ISBN could be the free ones that the sites offer, but again, they're each considered different versions of the same book, just like having a 'large print, a paperback and a hard back would each require different ISBNs to distinquish them when bookstores tried to order them.
As for buying multiple ISBNs (at a discount price) and then loaning them out, it would make more sense to make a small 'independent publishing' company which features multiple writers. That way, there's one distinct name attached to each writer (which readers could search for), but each writer could access the cheaper ISBN. ISBNs are prohibitively expensive unless you order a BUNCH of them. Thus it's cheap ($1 a title) for SW, but expensive for someone's first foray into publishing.
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