Quote:
Originally Posted by BearMountainBooks
Yes, but my point is that publishers or authors could CHOSE to tie it to the ISBN which could move. The ASIN is just a number. Sure they have to track this stuff, but they don't have to change the title and other info that makes it confusing to the end reader. I don't follow that publisher, but it seems like they are deliberately repackaging the book in such a way that it makes it harder to track it's print history (you may have read it way back when and still own it) and any e-book history it had. I know publishers like to redo covers as they often have a certain look they are going for, but title? Unless it's a horrid title, that just makes things confusing.
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They can choose to use the ISBN, if they have rights to it (or just use it anyway, as some authors do, when sticking in backlist linked to old paper editions).
However, at Amazon, they still
have to have different ASIN's. Thus, there must be two editions (even if both use the same ISBN) and you don't get updates from one to the other.
Most publishers then require the author to remove the self-pub edition from Amazon, anyway.
Often covers must change, as well - the self-pubbed edition only had rights from the author for a specific edition or editions published by the author. Once a publisher is in place, they either have to buy the rights to the cover or create a new one (which they may do, anyway, if the original cover either wasn't very good or didn't fit what sells in the marketplace).
It all does lead to confusion (but not as bad as some authors, whom I have seen adding one edition after another of their books (presumably as they fix formatting issues), removing the old ones as they go. Maybe they are doing it to purposely mislead readers and try to improve sales (not a good plan, btw), but I think some of them are just ignorant of the process to replace their existing editions. Then again, if you get a flurry of bad formatting reviews, they may be trying to dump those with the new edition.
I can't see much reason to change the title, though (especially with most self-pubs), even on different editions for different countries (at least, not anymore).