Goodreads Librarians Group discussion
Policies & Practices
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When conflicting info has built up on one book edition
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Does the bad ISBN10 give a warning? If not, why not? It seems that librarians should heed those warnings (except on the ones for 294 ISBNs). If a librarian cannot figure out what to do, perhaps a thread should be opened here for more experienced librarians to investigate.
Discussion of one single edition on two threads is already quite enough, surely. And the issue of non-librarians adding books, which is what happened here, has already been talked about recently in another thread, and it's been agreed it wouldn't change. It's hard to tell whether the warning came up when the edition was first added over a year ago.
The deletions thread seems to be awaiting a decision from Rivka.
This thread is to ask about general approaches, whether editions like this should be left alone (I think I've done so in the past with other titles), or upon what principles they ought to be merged. e.g. ISBN or cover - and one I think might be significant, where the adders of the book are from, as that reflects what edition they're more likely to have/read if there is a conflict about what country's edition it is.
This might surprise you, but I have no need to read the deletions thread unless I have a book that needs to be deleted, so I am completely unaware of any discussion elsewhere. This folder shouldn't be about a specific book, but about policies and practices for all books. I was wondering specifically about when a librarian edits a book (adds a cover) and the warning on a bad ISBN10. If that doesn't happen - and it should - where else than in policies and practices should it be discussed? It seems to me that it probably didn't happen, or the librarian didn't heed the warning. As many members add because of cover, adding a wrong cover is at the root of the problem of so many adding this edition, perhaps erroneously.
However, as to the main question, I don't see that it is the duty of librarians to make sure that members shelve the right edition. How are we to know they didn't intend to add this edition?
The start of my first post mentioned there was a discussion in that thread as well. I started this thread because I wanted to clarify general policy, and what is done with other books like this.I don't just mean re. ISBNs - but for example when someone has put the wrong edition's cover on an ISBN, and it's the definitely wrong cover (eg from a different country) but some users may have shelved by cover, and by correcting the cover, you mess up their catalogue.
I was wondering specifically about when a librarian edits a book (adds a cover) and the warning on a bad ISBN10. If that doesn't happen - and it should - where else than in policies and practices should it be discussed? It seems to me that it probably didn't happen, or the librarian didn't heed the warning. As many members add because of cover, adding a wrong cover is at the root of the problem of so many adding this edition, perhaps erroneously.
This is a very good point.
I can't remember if the warning comes up then.
If it doesn't, it should.
How are we to know they didn't intend to add this edition?
Yes, we can't tell what edition people intended to add. (Or if they cared which one, for that matter.) That's why I can see an argument for leaving these things alone.
Possibly it could be determined in this instance by seeing who added the edition before and after the cover was added, but that seems like a silly amount of work for a minor issue.
I think when an ISBN has been truncated (and we see this frequently), the edition should be merged with the edition with the correct ISBN. It's hard for me to see any reason for not merging, and the information on the edition with the truncated ISBN is wrong. It should not exist.
Antonomasia wrote: "I don't just mean re. ISBNs - but for example when someone has put the wrong edition's cover on an ISBN, and it's the definitely wrong cover (eg from a different country) but some users may have shelved by cover, and by correcting the cover, you mess up their catalogue.."Just my opinion but their catalog is WRONG. We should not be in the habit of disseminating incorrect information simply because someone likes a book cover. If the cover is attached to the wrong ISBN then that ISBN needs to be corrected.
If we do not correct the information, we are - in reality - spreading incorrect information across the globe. And that's just beyond the pale. A lot of people expect that GR catalogs are as correct as possible. GR catalog information becomes widely spread therefore it should be as accurate as possible at all times.
Mod
And I don't believe anyone was suggesting such incorrect editions not be merged -- just discussing what they should be merged with.
I'll just add that I've run across some hum-dingers in the past (just search for the Harlequin threads for examples). In the instance where several changes against policy have accumulated over time, I try hard to walk back all the bad changes, if possible. Once I have the edition back to the state it was created in (or the state immediately prior to the bad change(s)), I tend to give priority to the cover, which is a general rule of thumb I've seen applied a lot in the librarian group threads. Rarely do you run into a situation where a book was created with conflicting data; usually the problem is incomplete data or truncated data (in the case of ISBNs). I will also merge any inadvertent duplicates created after the original record was changed against policy. And I'll try to keep track of alternate cover editions and add those in, too, while walking back cover changes against policy.
It is not our responsibility to read the minds of users -- we have no idea why they shelved whatever edition. Librarians can only exert control over the quality of a given record, so I try to keep that in mind when deciding what to do about a vandalized record.
Z-squared wrote: "I'll just add that I've run across some hum-dingers in the past (just search for the Harlequin threads for examples). In the instance where several changes against policy have accumulated over tim..."Quality control. That's the perfect phrase in this instance.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/edits/...
UK based non-librarian user creates edition with no picture, puts ISBN13 (9780099555162) of a UK edition in ISBN10 field. Probably uses a different spelling of the author's name. 11 days later a Lithuanian librarian puts the American cover on this edition. A couple of weeks after that, another librarian corrects the author name and combines the edition with others. Now 117 people have added it.
I thought it should be merged with the UK edition with the correct ISBN13. But not everyone agrees.
These things must happen with other popular books - what's usually done?
Do they get left alone?