ISBN help

[Strayer]

I have a Smashwords free ISBN on an ebook. The ebook is also on B&N with the B&N ID number. Do I replace the B&N ID number with the ISBN? Would it matter? The book is also at Kindle.

[tawnmaru · Accepted solution]

ISBN numbers are assigned by each distributor or publisher, and that's where the payments are directed to go.

Your book that is being sold by Smashwords (for their 15% cut) has it's own ISBN that lists them as "publisher". Your book on Barnes has its own number, Amazon, it's own number, and so forth. (unless you are using Smashwords to publish on these websites and you didn't do it yourself.)

If you try to replace the Barnes number with the Smashwords number, I think their system would catch it.

If you want to have a book distributed to all retailers and not lose 15% switch from Smashwords to First Edition Design Ebook. All they take is a 4.5% fee for handling the finances. They take no cut of the royalties.

Did that make sense?

[Strayer]

Thank you so much. I thought it was a Smashwords ISBN as they are the publisher on their site etc. I wanted to make sure.

[cale]

Actually, if you sell a book through Amazon, B&N etc. then you are the publisher. (And you should come up with a name for your publishing company.) If you choose not to use an ISBN then Amazon will asign an ASIN (their own private version of an ISBN) to your book. B&N uses what they call a BN ID. I suppose most online retailers have something similar. It's basically just a catalog number.

If you buy an ISBN, you can use that anywhere you upload the book to the best of my knowledge. They can be expensive though. The only cheap way to get one I know of in the USA is through EpubBud. The only caveat with them is that EpubBud will be listed as the publisher in the Bowker database. However, I believe you can still list your own publishing name anywhere you upload the ebook.

[tawnmaru]

Some distributors won't allow you to use your own ISBN you buy from Bowker because they want to get the money first so they can take their cut. That's the point of the ISBN, to ID the book to let sellers know where to give the royalties.

It doesn't matter if you're listed as "publisher" of the book if the money is going first to someone else who takes a cut. For example, Smashwords gives out "free" ISBNs because they are ensuring they get the money first to take their percentage out before they pay you.

You don't need Smashwords. You can use an ebook distributor that doesn't take that big a cut, like First Edition Design. (I think Smashwords takes the highest percentage of any of them).

In other words, when you self-publish, unless you are distributing the book yourself, on your own website (in which case why would you need an ID number?) you don't need to buy an ISBN, you won't be allowed to use it.

[cale]

I understand that distributors like BookBaby, SmashWords, and Lulu will be listed as the publisher unless you pay an extra fee to list your own company. But even if you pay that extra fee, since they supply the ISBN, then like EpubBud, they will be listed with Bowker as the publisher even though your publishing company's name is on the book. I know that most of these companies are aggregators who take a percentage of the royalties for their services. I've not been able to find anything at EpubBud's site where they take a cut though. I've not used them yet myself, so I can't really vouch for the company even though they seem to have a pretty good reputation. I would suggest that anyone thinking of purchasing an ISBN from them should contact them and ask for more details. Even if you use an ISBN, when you upload at B&N or Amazon, they will send payments to whoever the uploader's account is with (namely you).

Also, according to Bowker, you need to have a different ISBN for each version of a book including different versions of e-book formats. They specifically say that you need different ISBNs for mobi and epub, and pdf files. It gets very expensive buying them through Bowker, but that does seem to be the safest way to procure an ISBN.

[Strayer]

Thanks, all. I'm not buying an ISBN as of now. I uploaded to B&N and Amazon all by myself. I don't mind Smashwords getting a cut, they distribute to other readers. It can also be good for getting a book out there a bit.

[cale]

It turns out that I gave incorrect information. If you buy an ISBN from anybody other than Bowker, whether SW, LuLu or whoever, THEY will be considered the pubisher and all royalties go to them. I'm sure SW and the others takes a percentage of the royalties for doing it, and that may be fine with you, but remember, they are the publisher of record now even though they state that you can still do whatever you want with the books.

Bowker has a ridiculous monopoly on ISBNs that the government really needs to stop. In many countries ISBNs are made available free of charge. After all, it only takes a second for a computer to generate a random set of numbers for you. For Bowker to charge over a hundred bucks for something as simple as snapping your fingers is truly disgusting. Write to your congressman about this and ask them to make ISBNs free like in Canada and France.

[SF50]

Cale,

This is incorrect information. People keep linking ISBN with royalties, they are not linked. Smashwords gets a cut of your royalties because they're distributing your book for you, not because you use an ISBN that they gave/sold you. The same is for Lulu. The ISBN is because Lulu needs to assign one for distribution to various places, and the royalty cut is because of the distribution. Who assigns your ISBN has NOTHING to do with your royalties. That someone assigns your ISBN doesn't have some mysterious hidden meaning that says you're giving up rights to your book.

Example: Smashwords has a "premium" ISBN you can buy for $9.95 that would list you as the author and publisher and leave their name off of it entirely. You buy it then you have them distribute your book to Apple, Sony, etc. And they would still take the same cut of the royalties as they would if you'd had them assign a free ISBN to you.

In short: ISBNs do not link royalties to someone. ISBNs do not control rights. If that were true I could register ISBNs with everyones book information and magically be the publisher of record and get all your royalties. Doesn't make sense now does it?

Have a good day,

SF

eB Format - eBook formatting and conversions services 

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cale wrote:

It turns out that I gave incorrect information. If you buy an ISBN from anybody other than Bowker, whether SW, LuLu or whoever, THEY will be considered the pubisher and all royalties go to them. I'm sure SW and the others takes a percentage of the royalties for doing it, and that may be fine with you, but remember, they are the publisher of record now even though they state that you can still do whatever you want with the books.

[markcoker]

Hi all, Mark Coker from Smashwords here.  There's quite a bit of incorrect info above regarding ISBNs.  SF's information is the most accurate.

An ISBN is simply a numeric identifier.  It has absolutely no bearing on who gets paid, or who has a right to claim your future earnings.  If you upload your book directly to B&N Pubit, they pay you, not the "publisher" according to Bowker's record.  If you distribute your book to B&N via Smashwords, B&N pays us and we pay you after taking our commission, which is 10% of the retail price.

Smashwords provides free ISBNs to our authors and publishers who want them.  We buy them so you don't have to.  Our authors are also welcome to go to Bowker and purchase their own.  We don't care where you get your ISBN as long as you follow Bowker's recommended rules, the most important of which is that the ISBN you provide us should be unique to the .epub version of your book.  Don't use the same ISBN you use for your print book, or your Kindle book, as your ISBN for Smashwords or B&N. 

Here, I'll show you how most our books with free ISBNs are displayed... This is a title by one of our bestselling authors, Brian S. Pratt that uses our FREE ISBN  - http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/star-of-morcyth-brian-s-pratt/1102095766?ean=2940000691229&itm=1&usr... Note how it appears as "Publisher:  Brian S. Pratt, via Smashwords"  Even though Smashwords is listed as the publisher in the Bowker record, Bryan is listed as the publisher because we consider all our authors the publishers.  Smashwords is a distributor, not a publisher.

Here's another.  This is my new free ebook, The Secrets to Ebook Publishing Success.  I used our FREE ISBN option.  The book appears at B&N as "Publisher:  Mark Coker, via Smashwords" 

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-secrets-to-ebook-publishing-success-mark-coker/1110197362?ean=29...

If you do violate Bowker's rules, don't worry, you won't grow hair on your palms or face other punishment.  At worst, you'll cause confusion within the ebook supply chain.  If a library, for example, tries to acquire a print version of your book, yet the ISBN you supplied at Amazon for your self-pubbed print book is registered to an .epub file you published and distributed at Smashwords, the library will contact Smashwords and we'll tell them we're sorry, we don't do print books.  Yes, this has happened quite often when authors try to cut corners on ISBNs.

As SF mentioned, we also have a $9.95 option that will record the author as the "publisher" in the Bowker record.  I think our free ISBN is better, because it's free, but for those who absolutely positively want to be listed as the publisher in the Bowker record, it's an option.  It's an option we intended to be used only by publishers who are publishing multiple authors.  For a single author's own book, we consider our $9.95 option to be a vanity option and a waste of money.  Most of your readers won't discover your book by searching for an ISBN number.

Whether or not Bowker lists the author or Smashwords or Santa Claus as the "publisher" has no impact on who gets paid for the book. It also has no impact on copyright and no impact on who is the true legal publisher.

We provide detailed information about ISBNs at the Smashwords FAQ at https://www.smashwords.com/about/supportfaq#isbn - and in our ISBN Manager at https://www.smashwords.com/dashboard/ISBNManager Our FAQs is your best first stop if you have questions about Smashwords services.

Bowker also has many FAQs at their web site.

Thanks!

[Mrs-Smith]

And thanks for stopping by and clearing this up for us

[Strayer]

Thanks Mark.

[cale]

"Smashwords gets a cut of your royalties because they're distributing your book for you, not because you use an ISBN that they gave/sold you."

You misread me, or I didn't make myself clear, because that's what I was saying. The aggregator will be the publisher of record if you buy the ISBN through them, and they will collect the royalties, take their cut, and give you the rest. I mentioned in an earlier post that you could buy a cheap one through EpubBud, and they make it sound as though the ISBN is all yours once you have it. I just wanted to point out that this is not true. Apparently EpubBud wants you to publish through them in order to get that cheap ISBN—something they don't mention on their ISBN sales page. And they only publish children's books anyway I think.

Unless you buy the ISBN through the Bowker monopoly, you will not be listed with them as the publisher of record period. The only other way to get an ISBN is to go through an aggregator which makes the aggregator the publisher of record. So what does being the publisher of record at Bowker have to do with the true ownership rights to the books? How will the courts look at this? Nobody knows. There are few topics with murkier waters in publishing than that of ISBN ownership.

One thing we do know when it comes to print books is that they are ordered by the ISBN number, so whoever is listed as the publisher of record is who the bookstores will order books from, and that's important to remember.

And I may be wrong, but as I understand it, if you get your ISBN through an aggregator, you can't then take your epub or mobi file with the ISBN you got through them, and then upload it to other retailers that this aggregator doesn't already cover. You would have to buy another ISBN to do that.

There is another very important caveat in all this that I'll address to Mr. Coker.

[cale]

“For a single author's own book, we consider our $9.95 option to be a vanity option and a waste of money.  Most of your readers won't discover your book by searching for an ISBN number.”

You're forgetting something very important here Mark. People who are self publishing usually don't want anyone to know it. The bias against self-published books is evident to everyone and the kiss of death to sales usually, even of good books. And don't think readers aren't hip to this. You can find threads all over the place at Amazon's Kindle boards where people discuss ways to know before buying a book whether or not it's self published so they can avoid “accidentally buying crap.” Most know by now that if they see a book listed with an ASIN instead of an ISBN that it's self published even if there's a publishing company name listed in the book's info. section. Same with BN ID. And even if a book has an ISBN, if that ISBN has SmashWords or LuLu or CreateSpace's name beside it, regardless of whether or not another publishing company is listed also (or an individual), it will still be a dead giveaway that the book is self published.

“Whether or not Bowker lists the author or Smashwords or Santa Claus as the "publisher" has...no impact on copyright and no impact on who is the true legal publisher.”

How do you know this? I don't know of any legal precedent regarding the subject. Is there a specific court case you can site?

[SF50]

Cale against my better judgment I'm going to respond to your post.

You're still talking about royalties and ISBNs as though one is dependent on the other. They are not. I can go buy an ISBN from Bowker and use it on Smashwords or anywhere and the place I'm using it on STILL gets a cut of the royalties because they're acting as the distributor of the ebook. It has absolutely no bearing on anything where I get the ISBN from so long as it's properly assigned to the right version (paperback, hardcover, EPUB, MOBI etc) of my book.

The epubbud portion of your conversation has nothing to do with me so I've no response to that.

ISBNs have absolutely nothing to do with ownership of rights of a book. Nothing. I could go register an ISBN with every one of your book's titles and information right now, and you would still be the copyright holder for your book. Here is a link to a website that might be able to ease your fears about how copyrights actually work: U.S. Copyright Office

Your second to last paragraph:

"And I may be wrong.." ..

To say the least.

If an aggregator gives you a free ISBN then it typically is in their ToS that it is to be used only on their system. Smashwords or Lulu (or whoever) is doing it to help you use their business. Without this type of policy everyone would just use those websites as free ISBN dispensaries. Puts a bit of a hole in the business model, hence the policy not to be used elsewhere. It's all dependent on which ISBN(pay/free and which company) you're referring to when you say:

"..if you get your ISBN through an aggregator, you can't then take your epub or mobi file with the ISBN you got through them, and then upload it to other retailers that this aggregator doesn't already cover."

All that said, if it seems that I'm a little annoyed it's because I am. I do ebook conversions and as part of that I have no probelms answering every last question of clients of mine. Questions about ISBNs come up the most and they're the ones that people have the most incorrect information about so when I see a full thread with people trying to sort it out, and someone passing on wrong or mostly wrong information, it gets annoying. I emailed Mark when Smashwords came up because I knew he'd come in to clear up the misinformation about the ISBNs relating to Smashwords, and I thank him for putting a more "official" voice on the matter. Hopefully people see his post on this thread and take his information in this thread above all else.

Thank you,

SF

eB Format - eBook formatting and conversions

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cale wrote:

"Smashwords gets a cut of your royalties because they're distributing your book for you, not because you use an ISBN that they gave/sold you."

You misread me, or I didn't make myself clear, because that's what I was saying. The aggregator will be the publisher of record if you buy the ISBN through them, and they will collect the royalties, take their cut, and give you the rest. I mentioned in an earlier post that you could buy a cheap one through EpubBud, and they make it sound as though the ISBN is all yours once you have it. I just wanted to point out that this is not true. Apparently EpubBud wants you to publish through them in order to get that cheap ISBN—something they don't mention on their ISBN sales page. And they only publish children's books anyway I think.

Unless you buy the ISBN through the Bowker monopoly, you will not be listed with them as the publisher of record period. The only other way to get an ISBN is to go through an aggregator which makes the aggregator the publisher of record. So what does being the publisher of record at Bowker have to do with the true ownership rights to the books? How will the courts look at this? Nobody knows. There are few topics with murkier waters in publishing than that of ISBN ownership.

One thing we do know when it comes to print books is that they are ordered by the ISBN number, so whoever is listed as the publisher of record is who the bookstores will order books from, and that's important to remember.

And I may be wrong, but as I understand it, if you get your ISBN through an aggregator, you can't then take your epub or mobi file with the ISBN you got through them, and then upload it to other retailers that this aggregator doesn't already cover. You would have to buy another ISBN to do that.

There is another very important caveat in all this that I'll address to Mr. Coker.

---

[Strayer]

The ISBN identifies the book and is also the way to find the book at a library or school and other places where they use ISBN. A library orders a book using the ISBN. My book can't go into a library without the ISBN. This goes for ebooks as well, and I know I'm repeating this. I uploaded to Smashwords because it was much better than my uploading to the different Ereaders. I just want to be sure that I had the the right ID numbers on B&N and Kindle. I had uploaded the book before I uploaded it at Smashwords. Smashwords has been very good to me and I think they are great. SF50 helped me when I asked about putting the book on Smashwords and I thank you.

[cale]

“You're still talking about royalties and ISBNs as though one is dependent on the other.”

No I did not! What I said was: “The aggregator will be the publisher of record IF YOU BUY THE ISBN THROUGH THEM, AND THEY WILL COLLECT THE ROYALTIES, take their cut, and give you the rest.”

“I can go buy an ISBN from Bowker and use it on Smashwords or anywhere and the place I'm using it on STILL gets a cut of the royalties because they're acting as the distributor of the ebook.”

Who said they didn't? Isn't that rather obvious and not worth mentioning?

“ISBNs have absolutely nothing to do with ownership of rights of a book.”

I wouldn't be so sure. If an author failed to register a copyright with the book (and it's been my experience that very few self-published people bother registering a copyright), then how else will the courts decide who is the legal owner unless they go by the owner of the ISBN? This is simply not as cut and dry as you want to make it, and you'll find oodles of articles on the subject all saying exactly what I'm telling you.

“Puts a bit of a hole in the business model, hence the policy not to be used elsewhere. It's all dependent on which ISBN(pay/free and which company) you're referring to....”

Really? I've already stated why it's still foolish to even take the $9.95 option through SmashWords since it won't hide the fact that you're self-published. Secondly, that option only gets you the ISBN for the Epub—not the Mobi file.

Lastly, if you get an ISBN anyplace other than from Bowker, even if you registered a copyright, you may be the legal owner of the book, but this does not give you the publishing and/or distribution rights. If someone else is registered as the publisher of record, there's nothing to stop them from issuing as cease and desist order to keep you from distributing your own book since you've basically given THEM the rights to do so. “Terms of Service” be damned. Those are not necessarily binding legal contracts. They may or may not hold up in court. If they will, then show me a court case in which this has been tried and settled. I know of none, and don't think you do either.

You may say that this is because no self-published author have ever had to go to court over ISBN/distribution, therefore it's all harmless and moot. Let's just wait and see what happens when a self-published author finally has a huge Harry Potter type hit on his/her hands. If you think the distributor/aggregator isn't going to do everything in their power to keep you from distributing that book through retail channels they don't have a partnership with, you're just kidding yourself.

To say the least.

Buying ISBNs through the Bowker monopoly and distributing your books yourself is the ONLY reasonably safe option, and even that is not without it's foibles.

[SF50]

Cale,

ISBNs have nothing to do with rights ownership. You can theorize about what might possibly maybe could happen one day if maybe this or that happens all you want but this thread is about fact not your legal theory about the future. The fact is this: ISBNs do not have anything to do with copyrights and rights ownership.

Have a nice day,

SF

eB Format - ebook formatting and conversion services

[Mrs-Smith]

Wow. How this post has digressed...

[cale]

"ISBNs do not have anything to do with copyrights"

Which is what I said three times, had you been paying attention....

Nobody appreciates people who just purposely try to be rude. If that's your regular mode of operation, please refrain from posting further to me.