Saturday, May 08, 2010

With or Without You, Your Google Editions Will Have Unique ISBNs
from PublishersLunch

Google has finally made public their decision on identifiers for products sold through Google Editions. They will use the industry-standard ISBN--as opposed to vendors like Amazon, who assign their own unique ASINs to Kindle books.

Google hopes that publishers will assign unique ISBNs to their Google Editions products on their own, but if they don't, Google will assign numbers themselves in an agreement announced today with US ISBN agency Bowker.

Google's Tom Turvey says in the announcement "this decision was driven by the book industry's strong reliance on the ISBN along with our partner-centric business and distribution models. We look forward to working closely with Bowker, our publishing and retail partners and the ISBN Standards Community to ensure a stabilized and uniform approach to the cataloging, discovery and selling of Google Editions."

No comments: