Quote:
Originally Posted by fjtorres
Why would they?
ASINs (or whatever the other retailers use) are internal use numbers generated by manufacturers or the retailers, often based on their UPC number. They're not terribly relevant on the consumer side.
ISBNs are essentially pointers into a database that can be used to extract records about a given title: author, publisher, release date, book title.
Well, instead of giving an ebook a pointer to an external database, the ebook carries all the relevant data internally. And more: promo summaries, keywords, etc. Retailers read the data and feed it to their online catalog without having to tap into an external system. Amazon, for one, uses keywords to steer readers to books according to genre, sub-genre, topic, etc. So it behooves publishers to make sure the metadata accurately represents the book because these days just stocking a book is no guarantee it will be visible to buyers. Good metadata can guide a superhero romcom to romance readers *and* comedy fans as well as superhero fiction fans. And that is valuable to both readers and publishers.
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Thanks for this. Methinks I'll spend a bit more time on metadata before uploading...