RE: [metadata] FYI: BIBTEX Update at the LoC

This is correct from the supply chain point of view. The ISBN is a product identifier for the supply chain. So if you are providing them as products, they should have ISBNs.

Note that this doesn't preclude assigning DOIs to them for other reasons: discovery, management, etc.

One reason you might want to do that is if you are providing the chapters in various formats. If so, each format must have its own ISBN-EPUB, PDF, Mobi, etc. The DOI in that case (as it can do for books) can sit at a higher level of abstraction and provide a unique, persistent identifier for that chapter independent of what format it is delivered in. This is how it works for journal articles, and the publishers that assign DOIs to book chapters (there are many of them in the STM space) find it useful in just this way because the DOI appears in citations to the book chapter just as a journal article DOI appears in a journal citation, and it's agnostic as to what format the recipient ultimately wants it to be provided in (and it can change over time without making the DOI obsolete, which is not the case with the ISBN: if there is a new EJAZZ format someday, it gets a new ISBN but the same DOI still works in all those citations).

From: AUDRAIN LUC [mailto:LAUDRAIN@hachette-livre.fr]
Sent: Monday, December 09, 2013 3:24 AM
To: Bill Kasdorf; Robert Sanderson
Cc: Ivan Herman; Tim Clark; W3C Digital Publishing IG
Subject: RE: [metadata] FYI: BIBTEX Update at the LoC

Thanks for this information on DOIs.

I've been recently asked about an identifier for individual chapters and found this proposition in than FAQ of the International ISBN Agency

*  How do I identify individual chapters or other parts of a book that I plan to make available separately?<javascript:void(0);>
If you are making chapters or other parts of a book separately available through the normal supply chain and want to have them listed in trade databases then you should regard them as individual publications and assign ISBNs to them.  If they will only be available through a single source, such as the publisher's website, then proprietary internal identifiers will be adequate.
In the ebook supply chain, I don't know if any e-distributor supports DOI, I'm afraid none today.

Best,
Luc

De : Bill Kasdorf [mailto:bkasdorf@apexcovantage.com]
Envoyé : dimanche 8 décembre 2013 22:41
À : Robert Sanderson
Cc : Ivan Herman; Tim Clark; W3C Digital Publishing IG
Objet : RE: [metadata] FYI: BIBTEX Update at the LoC

All true, but I am still a big proponent of the DOI. ;-)

Characterizing it as based on a "resolving site" makes it sound like some website or server that could go down at any moment. It's based on the Handle system and it is an incredibly robust, global infrastructure. So yes, that's where the "actionable" part of DOI being an actionable identifier comes from, but I can attest that from the point of view of scholarly publishing it has had a revolutionary impact, and it works.

Yes, it is more for human redirection than anything else; that too is part of its power. The flexibility it provides publishers is the key to why it has worked so well for them. True, it may or may not take you directly to the content; that's not its purpose. Its purpose is to provide a persistent link to whatever the party controlling the DOI wants the link to resolve to. And to enable that to change whenever necessary, without the DOI itself ever needing to change. That's a feature, not a bug! ;-)

It also enables each RA (Registration Agency) to provide whatever services are appropriate for its particular needs and functions. CrossRef is by far the biggest RA, but they are not the only RA. The EU Publications Office is an RA; they use the DOI in a completely different way. The DOI is used in the entertainment industry-again, in a way that suits those needs. CrossRef provides, fundamentally, cross-publisher linking services, and related services like plagiarism detection and identification of the latest version of an article (including alerting people to articles that have been retracted), all of which are very valuable to scholarly publishing. That's all built on the nature and flexibility of the DOI.

So again, your points are all completely valid and correct, and I understand why you take the point of view that you do.

But I have seen this provide such incredible value to scholarly publishing that I can't help but be a big fan of it. For what it is designed to do, and for how CrossRef has implemented it, it has been and continues to be hugely successful and an enormous benefit to the scholarly publishing industry, publishers, libraries, and scholars/researchers alike.

--Bill K