RE: As an aside, a possibly interesting read....

Actually, the DOI _is_ used for this, mainly by scholarly/STM publishers, as well as for chapters of books--typically one DOI for the book and a DOI for each chapter (and sometimes DOIs at even lower component levels, most often for figures and tables). And these are _agnostic_ as to format, they typically mean "the book" and "the chapter" in the abstract sense. When you click on one of these DOIs you are usually then given your choice of what format, whether you have access, how to obtain access, etc.

But it requires the associated systems, metadata, registration agency, etc. to make it work. To belabor a point, though, in that context it does work. There are a gazillion of them. The whole scholarly/STM ecosystem is now dependent on DOIs.

Those that use the DOI for this use CrossRef DOIs, which _should_ be expressed as URIs (and increasingly are).

But all that is purely under the control of the publisher (including what the DOI links to and what that destination provides--not necessarily the content itself); it doesn't address "work" in the way librarians mean "work," and it requires the systems I mentioned (including the Handle system on which DOI is based). It would not work for our need to point to the "work itself" or some component of the work. So the answer in a purely standard web-world sense is still no.

--Bill K

-----Original Message-----
From: Laura Dawson [mailto:Laura.Dawson@bowker.com] 
Sent: Wednesday, September 24, 2014 2:55 PM
To: Ivan Herman; Graham Bell
Cc: Laura Dawson; Phil Madans; Bill Kasdorf; W3C Public Digital Publishing IG Mailing List
Subject: Re: As an aside, a possibly interesting read....

As it stands now, no. So a book's "home" on the web (regardless of
edition) is not standardizable at this point unless you want to go down the DOI road (please let's not go down the DOI road).

On 9/24/14, 4:13 AM, "Ivan Herman" <ivan@w3.org> wrote:

>Thanks for all the interesting discussion...
>
>However: all this is to say that there does not seem to be any existing 
>(and viable) option to uniquely identify (preferably through a URI) a 
>'work' (whether in the ISTC or the FRBR sense). Which is a problem for 
>metadata as well as for archiving. :-( Tell me I am wrong, please...
>
>Ivan
>
>
>On 24 Sep 2014, at 24:19 , Graham Bell <graham@editeur.org> wrote:
>
>> And they can be treated this way in ONIX too. As I said,
>> 
>>> they are not (strictly) an attribute of the ISBN, though they may be 
>>>presented as such in various systems
>> 
>> G
>> 
>> NB repeatable because the ISBN is associated directly with only one 
>>work, but can be indirectly associated (through that work) with 
>>several other works.
>> 
>> 
>> On 23 Sep 2014, at 21:12, LAURA DAWSON wrote:
>> 
>>> Yes, even at Bowker we made them a repeatable attribute on the ISBN 
>>>record.
>>> 
>>> From: "Madans, Phil" <Phil.Madans@hbgusa.com>
>>> Date: Tuesday, September 23, 2014 at 3:13 PM
>>> To: Laura Dawson <ljndawson@gmail.com>, Graham Bell 
>>><graham@editeur.org>, Bill Kasdorf <bkasdorf@apexcovantage.com>, Ivan 
>>>Herman <ivan@w3.org>, W3C Public Digital Publishing IG Mailing List 
>>><public-digipub-ig-comment@w3.org>
>>> Subject: Re: As an aside, a possibly interesting read....
>>> 
>>> I stand corrected on the assignment of the ISTC. Bad choice of words.
>>>I was speaking more on how I would have to manage them internally on 
>>>the systems level¯that's how I think about these things¯and that 
>>>would be as an attribute.  That  all depends on how titles systems 
>>>are structured, and I'm not saying ours is the best way to do things, 
>>>but I think the way we do it is how most do it these days. From a 
>>>practical standpoint, I'm not sure how else I could handle them. IF I 
>>>publish an English and Spanish edition of a work, and the ISTC's are 
>>>different, then they would be attributes of the ISBNs so that I could 
>>>keep them linked internally.  We are already doing this, as is most 
>>>everyone else, and I think that is why the ISTC was such a hard sell.
>>> 
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> Phil Madans | Executive Director of Digital Publishing Technology | 
>>>Hachette Book Group | 237 Park Avenue NY 10017 |212-364-1415 | 
>>>phil.madans@hbgusa.com
>>> 
>>> From: LAURA DAWSON <ljndawson@gmail.com>
>>> Date: Tuesday, September 23, 2014 at 2:22 PM
>>> To: Graham Bell <graham@editeur.org>, Phil Madans 
>>><phil.madans@hbgusa.com>, Bill Kasdorf <bkasdorf@apexcovantage.com>, 
>>>Ivan Herman <ivan@w3.org>, W3C Public Digital Publishing IG Mailing 
>>>List <public-digipub-ig-comment@w3.org>
>>> Subject: Re: As an aside, a possibly interesting read....
>>> 
>>> Bowker was an ISTC registration agency until recently. We pulled out 
>>>because of the lack of support in the US, and refer the few curious 
>>>to Nielsen.
>>> 
>>> From: Graham Bell <graham@editeur.org>
>>> Date: Tuesday, September 23, 2014 at 2:09 PM
>>> To: Phil Madans <Phil.Madans@hbgusa.com>, Laura Dawson 
>>><ljndawson@gmail.com>, Bill Kasdorf <bkasdorf@apexcovantage.com>, 
>>>Ivan Herman <ivan@w3.org>, W3C Public Digital Publishing IG Mailing 
>>>List <public-digipub-ig-comment@w3.org>
>>> Subject: Re: As an aside, a possibly interesting read....
>>> 
>>> What Phil and Laura have written certainly summarises -- and 
>>>illustrates -- the debate over identifiers.
>>> 
>>> But the text below (from Phil) is a little misleading.
>>> 
>>>> Whether an ISTC
>>>> is a real work Identifier or not is a matter of debate. I disagree 
>>>>that ii  is. It is actually an attribute of the ISBN¯-hat is how 
>>>>they are assigned.
>>>> Different ISBNs of the same master content might have different 
>>>>ISTC's.
>>>> Translations for instance.
>>> 
>>> The 'rules' of the ISTC say that translations are by definition 
>>>different works, and MUST have different ISTCs (though those ISTCs 
>>>will be related to each other -- one is a 'derived work', and this 
>>>close relationship is recorded in the registration metadata for the 
>>>ISTCs themselves). This contrasts with library practice, where 'work' 
>>>is something at a higher level and two translations are actually 
>>>termed two 'expressions' of the same 'work'. In library terms, the 
>>>ISTC is an expression identifier. See the attached PDF (a slide from 
>>>a training session that I deliver fairly regularly) for a summary of 
>>>how the <indecs> model on which ISTC and ONIX are based compares with 
>>>the FRBR library model. There is -- as far as I know -- no public 
>>>identifier that works at the FRBR:work level, though libraries may 
>>>have internal IDs.
>>> 
>>> And I'm pretty sure ISTCs can be assigned without an ISBN (and 
>>>without any product ID at all, in fact) -- they are not (strictly) an 
>>>attribute of the ISBN, though they may be presented as such in various systems.
>>>They can be registered based on a manuscript, prior to there being a 
>>>product.
>>> 
>>> On the other hand, there's no doubt that ISTC has so far proved 
>>>unpopular among publishers, for some of the reasons Laura and Phil 
>>>list, and its actual usage is minimal.
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Graham
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> Graham Bell
>>> EDItEUR
>>> 
>>> Tel: +44 20 7503 6418
>>> Mob: +44 7887 754958
>>> 
>>> EDItEUR Limited is a company limited by guarantee, registered in 
>>>England no 2994705. Registered Office: United House, North Road, 
>>>London
>>>N7 9DP, UK. Website: http://www.editeur.org
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> This may contain confidential material. If you are not an intended 
>>>recipient, please notify the sender, delete immediately, and 
>>>understand that no disclosure or reliance on the information herein is permitted.
>>>Hachette Book Group may monitor email to and from our network.
>> 
>
>
>----
>Ivan Herman, W3C
>Digital Publishing Activity Lead
>Home: http://www.w3.org/People/Ivan/
>mobile: +31-641044153
>GPG: 0x343F1A3D
>WebID: http://www.ivan-herman.net/foaf#me
>
>
>
>
>

Received on Wednesday, 24 September 2014 19:14:30 UTC