First edition or alternate edition?

[Greg]

I wanted to add an old children's book I read as a child to the database. It was first published in 1964 though the (undated) printing of this book could be anywhere between 1965 and 1974 because it uses the original 9-digit SBN. Converting the SBN to an ISBN by adding the initial '0' brings up a 1992 edition of the book that was apparently first published in 1987 and has an accompanying floppy disk with digital music on it.

Since the manual states that the 'publication date for an alternate-cover edition should be the date the book was released with the new cover, not the date the book with that ISBN or ASIN was originally published', what's the best way of adding this book to the database? I was thinking that the simplest way would be to add the book as another edition of the 1992 version, change the earliest publication date of that entry to 1964 and then alert a super to the need for removing the ISBN of the 1992 edition and reassigning it to the 1964 one. Would this work?

[Sandra]

Sorry no. The first book in the database keeps the ISBN regardless of date published. That is just GR policy.

You add your book with the date you think it is, without the ISBN. You can add the ISBN to the description field if you wish.

You probably also need to add the original publication date (towards the bottom of the edit page) as 1964.

[Greg]

Thanks Sandra!

[Greg]

Actually, there's another problem in that the author's son had evidently updated some of his father's books in the 1980s/1990s and is credited as co-author of the later editions (although the GR entry actually omits the father's name). Perhaps the son was the creator of the music accompanying the book in this case. The different editions also have different illustrators.

Furthermore, there are two separate entries for more recent editions of the book - Where We Go and Where We Go - which have been combined, but the author's son is no longer credited and there's no mention of a computer disk. Would it be better to combine my edition with these, changing the original publication date (given as 2004) and adding a librarian note about the ISBN? This would also have the advantage of availing of the series already designated for these books here.

[Krazykiwi]

That is what I would do. That original published date is likely not one entered by a librarian but autogenerated by the earliest known edition and needs fixing anyway.

[Greg]

Krazykiwi wrote: "That is what I would do. That original published date is likely not one entered by a librarian but autogenerated by the earliest known edition and needs fixing anyway."

Yeah it looks like the two recent editions were autogenerated while the 1987/'92 version was uploaded by a GR user. I'll add my edition to the two recent ones and see how that fits then.

[Greg]

The 1964 edition is now here: Where We Go.