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Once an ISBN has been assigned to a book, it belongs to that book permanently. The ISBN Users' Manual provides that an ISBN "can never be reused to identify another monographic publication, even if the original ISBN is found to have been assigned in error."¹ The manual also provides that a separate ISBN "should not be assigned to an unchanged edition or unchanged reprint of the same publication."¹ That rule applies where the reprint keeps the same product form, usage constraints, publisher, and imprint.¹ A number is fixed to one publication from the moment it is assigned.

Wording is one of the things that forces a new number

The manual draws its line at significance. One sentence carries both limbs of the rule. A separate ISBN "shall be assigned if there have been significant changes to any part or parts of a publication in relation to former editions of the publication."¹ The same sentence reaches significant changes in the physical or digital characteristics of the publication "in the new edition."¹ The manual then enumerates nine changes it has in mind, and five of them are textual.¹ Those five are the title or subtitle, the language, the publisher name or imprint, the author name, and "textual content other than minor corrections to misprints."¹

Product form is on the same list. The examples given are a move from hardback to paperback, and a move from an audiobook on a physical carrier to one available to download.¹ The manual adds a rule for publications issued in several manifestations at once. Where those manifestations differ in product form, product form detail, product form feature, or in sets of usage constraints "that influence the accessibility of the manifestation," each version "must also have its own ISBN."¹

What does not force one

The exclusions are narrower than the list above. A change to the cover design or color of a monographic publication does not require a separate ISBN, and neither does a change to its price.¹ The manual qualifies even that, noting that a separate ISBN "may be assigned if required by the supply chain."¹ The subtitle sits on the list of significant changes, and the cover design sits on the list of exclusions.

The copyright page answers to more than one authority

Several rules meet on one leaf. Under 17 U.S.C. 401(b), if a notice appears on the copies, "it shall consist of the following three elements."² The first is the symbol for copyright, or the word "Copyright", or the abbreviation "Copr."² The second is the year of first publication, and the third is the name of the owner of copyright, or a recognizable abbreviation or alternative designation.² Section 401(c) requires the notice to be affixed "in such manner and location as to give reasonable notice of the claim of copyright."²

Whether the notice appears at all is a separate question. The Copyright Office states in Circular 3 that "copyright notice is optional for works published on or after March 1, 1989, unpublished works, and foreign works."³ Optional is not the same as inconsequential. Section 401(d) reaches copies a defendant in an infringement suit had access to, where a notice in the form and position the section specifies appears.² In that case "no weight shall be given" to a defense of innocent infringement in mitigation of actual or statutory damages, subject to an exception at the last sentence of section 504(c)(2).²

A record prepared before the book exists

Part of that page is not composed in house. The Library of Congress states that the purpose of its Cataloging in Publication program "is to serve the nation's libraries by cataloging books in advance of publication."⁴ It also states that "the publisher prints the record (known as CIP data) on the verso of the title page," and that publishers submit applications through PrePub Book Link.⁴ The verso is the back of the title leaf, and the block printed there is supplied by the Library rather than composed in the office that prints it.

Subject codes, and how long a chosen one stays current

Subject codes are chosen once and then restated. The Book Industry Study Group states that "BISG best practices recommend that you select no more than three BISAC codes for any title."⁵ It adds that "choosing fewer than three is also best practice, when the codes chosen fully describe the book."⁵ It states that "the primary code should be the main subject of the book."⁵ Supplying both a specific and a general heading "is discouraged."⁵ The codes themselves are not fixed for good: BISG states that "the codes are updated annually, typically in late October or early November."⁵

The publisher's questions, and the editor's

Which ISBN belongs to which format, which subject codes describe a book, and who is named as the owner of copyright are questions for the publisher and its own advisors. Whether the answers given to those three questions appear consistently across the jacket, the title page, the copyright page, and the metadata record is a question for an editor. Everything a client sends us is held in confidence. That last question is the one we take, and it is answered by comparison rather than by opinion.

Comparison here means reading one fact in several places. A title appears on the jacket, on the title page, in the CIP block, and in the record sent to trading partners. An author's name appears in the copyright notice, in the CIP block, and in the running heads. Where two of those disagree, the disagreement goes back to the publisher, who decides which is right.