StarryGrandma

Welcome to Wikidata, StarryGrandma!

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Best regards! StarryGrandma (talk) 23:48, 22 January 2017 (UTC)

Unique identifiers

@StarryGrandma: In this discussion, you mentioned small publishers re-using expensive ISBNs, destroying their worth as unique identifiers. Do you think Wikidata could provide them with free unique identifiers? HLHJ (talk) 04:02, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Hi HLHJ. I don't believe that small publishers see any benefit to reusing ISBNs these days. Since so much bookselling happens online and is indexed by ISBNs, including used books, they would be hampering their sales of new items by such reuse. However Wikidata may need to be able to disambiguate ISBNs for older books that have the problem. StarryGrandma (talk) 01:11, 23 June 2019 (UTC)

Thank you, I didn't know that. I agree on the need for an ISBN disambiguator. Have the ISBNs now gotten cheaper? It seems silly to pay for a unique identifier, they are so cheap to make... HLHJ (talk) 03:09, 29 July 2019 (UTC)

Going through the process of officially registering numbers and adding them to databases probably takes employee time. They have gotten more expensive. However the older website lists them as just available in blocks of 10, 100, 1000, etc. With self-publishing they are now available as singles, at $125, with 10 for $295 and less per number in larger quantities. The Canadian government issues them to Canadian publishers for free. StarryGrandma (talk) 22:38, 30 July 2019 (UTC)