Standards & Metadata

BISAC Codes: Aboriginal Fiction

Book Industry Standards and Communications (BISAC) Subject Headings are the North American standard for classifying subject information for your books. Your books + BISAC subjects codes = glorious discoverability. This evolving standard is based on the work done by the Book Industry Study Group (BISG) Subject Codes Committee of which BNC is a member. And we represent you so there’s room for your involvement.

The purpose of my post today is to give you some insight on how a Subject Heading is created and how you can help us create one.

The 2011 BISAC Subject Codes

The Book Industry Study Group (BISG) has released the annual update of BISAC Subject Codes. The BISG committee works hard to make sure the subjects keep up with the changing publishing market, adding and removing codes and refining code definitions. While most codes remain the same year-to-year, publishers should review the changes and update their coding for all active titles (front and backlist) if it’s changed.

We look at the subject areas with the most changes, and what you need to know about the BISAC Subject Codes update.

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One for All? Should Different Markets or Retailers Get Different ONIX Files?

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A lot of software vendors and some firms go to great lengths to prepare ONIX files tailored to markets, creating separate files by certification standards for BISG, BookNet, and BIC. And some ONIX senders tailor their output based on what a retailer requests.

At BookNet Canada, we think that so long as the ONIX file is a properly prepared XML document it shouldn’t matter. Here’s why.

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Getting Data Dropped: Support and Update Your Records

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BNC BiblioShare has been getting queries from publishers asking why after dropping a record from their ONIX feed it hasn’t disappeared from The 49th Shelf. BiblioShare supplies data to a lot more firms than The 49th Shelf and that list is growing, but we like that you’re paying attention and finding problems in 49thShelf.com. Here’s an explanation straight from your ONIX feed about what’s happening.

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Tools of Change 2011: Overall Thoughts, Exciting New Projects, and Quotable Quotations

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Last week I attended the O’Reilly Tools of Change for Publishing 2011 conference .

This was my first year attending TOC and I loved it. If you’ve never been to TOC, it’s a whirlwind of a conference: workshops, keynotes, sessions, exhibitors, roundtable sessions, a startup showcase, and social events. I don’t think I blinked for three days, but it was a fantastic experience and I recommend it to any of you who can make it in future years.

There were also two projects that stood out for me. Here are the basics in their own words.

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EPUB 3.0 Draft Specification Published

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Today the IDPF made available the first public draft of the EPUB 3.0 specification (press release).

The IDPF has posted a good overview document to 3.0 that is worth spending a little time with. But here is a brief summary of some of the proposed new ‘features’, or changes, in EPUB 3.0.

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Stop Being an Enabler: BISG E-Book ISBN Study Findings

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Tom and I called in to the BISG meeting on Thursday (January 13, 2011) where the findings of the Identification of eBooks Research Project [pdf - slides] were revealed and discussed.

The results of this research are pretty distressing for someone who works with standards every day, but also (sadly) not at all surprising. Here are the key findings from the report…

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Best Practices for E-Books in ONIX

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What are the general guidelines for producing “good” ONIX support for e-books? Quality data exchange requires two things: clarity about how Product Identifiers are being used and the use of the ONIX 3.0 standard. Given that we are lacking both of these things, the answer to how to make a “good” e-book is a bit ambiguous. Use the following as a starting point, ask questions of your trading partners, and—please!—comment on this post.

 

 

BookNet Canada is a non-profit organization that develops technology, standards, and education to serve the Canadian book industry. Founded in 2002 to address systemic challenges in the industry, BookNet Canada supports publishing companies, booksellers, wholesalers, distributors, sales agents, industry associations, literary agents, media, and libraries across the country.

 

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