Goodreads Librarians Group discussion
Policies & Practices
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Policy on "split" ISBN10/ISBN13 for alternate cover ed's?
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https://www.goodreads.com/book/edits/... isbn 0671510053 onix firebrand
https://www.goodreads.com/book/edits/... isbn13 9780671510053 onix firebrand

Yes, but technically it is the SAME number - just incomplete on both edtions.
ISBN10 067151005-3 means exactly the same as ISBN13 978-067151005-3
It is just the 978 prefix and the checksum (which happens to be identical here) which make a "difference"...
...and according to the rules, only one work may have a assigned given ISBN.

I won't be surprised if that has changed since then, and I would like to know in any case, so let's wait for someone else to say what is the practise in the example you've given.

But the cases of split ISBN pairs I found were either duplicates and could be merged or cases were someone was removing one ISBN to add it to the ACE so it was clearly the change should be reverted.

As stated, the question boils down to:
- is it tolerated (considering that it is the SAME ISBN in two different modes of expression)?
and if it is not:
- which edition is going to loose its half-of-an-ISBN?
Still standing by for advice.

The newer database entry should lose the isbn and get a librarian note. Or, not unlikely that in some cases looking in the librarian change log you'll see that someone moved an isbn off an edition and if so, just revert the policy-violating move and put appropriate librarian note explaining without worrying about which was first record.
I'm no longer a librarian so you might want to get a more official answer from Rivka and other librarians -- but, it used to be policy that the first book record got to keep the isbn and subsequent editions (alternate cover or whatever) just got a librarian note that they also used isbn####.

I am having more or less the same doubts on another situation:
The author changed the title and cover of a book, but kept the same ASIN. Since the author asked for it, I changed the ASIN from the old book to the new one. But seing this tread, I am not sure anymore if it was OK to do this.
I'd like to have an other opinion on the subject. You can find the topic here:
https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
Thank you!
Renske wrote: "I would say that the ISBN that was listed first on Goodreads gets both and the other edition is marked as alternate cover edition."
Correct.
Correct.
what is common practice on books where two editions hold the SAME ISBN, one with ISBN10 filled in and empty ISBN13, one with empty ISBN10 and filled in ISBN13?
a) tolerate and leave as is?; or
b) take away ISBN from one and assign it to the other?
If b), which ought to be the "victim"?
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1... (older edition with ISBN10)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7... (newer edition with ISBN13)