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

On Sep 24, 2014, at 12:16 , LAURA DAWSON <ljndawson@gmail.com> wrote:

> Yes, Bowker were a DOI registration agency and I can tell you that the
> associated systems and metadata were the primary reason DOIs for trade
> books (as opposed to STEM/scholarly) never took off.
> 
> So you see, Ivan, the road to book URIs is littered with a couple of
> corpses.

It’s not just books.  I was on a project that needed something for recordings many years ago, and that road was also strewn with corpses.

> 
> On 9/24/14, 3:13 PM, "Bill Kasdorf" <bkasdorf@apexcovantage.com> wrote:
> 
>> 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
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>> 
> 
> 
> 

David Singer
Manager, Software Standards, Apple Inc.

Received on Wednesday, 24 September 2014 21:13:35 UTC