Book designer Jennifer Omner of ALL Publications wrote about ISBNs—unique numerical book identifiers that are assigned to each edition and variation (hard cover, soft cover, ebook, audio) of a book—in a recent newsletter. The information is so important and so on target that I asked her if I could run it. Her ISBN Warning:
I ran across this verbiage on a company’s website promoting self-publishing services: “We’ll automatically assign an ISBN to any book published through our system unless you provide one of your own. It’s a free service we provide because ISBNs allow us to distribute your book to more channels, and you don’t have to forfeit any of your rights. That’s good for you and good for us!”
Beware of misinformation. Regarding their claim of “you don’t have to forfeit any of your rights,” if you use THEIR ISBN on your book, THEY ARE the Publisher. That’s potentially a large “forfeit.” One example: Several of my clients’ books have been picked up by traditional publishing houses and that wouldn’t have been possible if they weren’t the Publisher.
Whoever owns the ISBN (International Standard Book Number) is the Publisher of record of the book. I always recommend that my clients buy their own blocks of ISBNs and are the Publishers. For more book publishing resources, please visit the Resources page of my website.
Please follow and like us:
Sorry, comments are closed for this post.