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This is a repeat of a post I made to the Blurberati blog on the same topic in this Blog post… It’s not had an answer hence why I’m repeating it here with very slight changes given the different ways in which people started to talk about bar codes on the back cover.
I’m puzzled. It seems to me there are two sets of people
(a) people who don’t want bar codes on their books
(b) people who want bar codes for ISBN numbers in the place where convention (ie the book shops such as Barnes and Noble) dictate they should be. I don’t understand what’s the problem. Neilsen states “If you wish to sell your publication through major bookselling chains, or internet booksellers, they will require you to have an ISBN to assist their internal processing and ordering systems.” An ISBN barcode has therefore got to take precedence over a printers tracking code surely? How is a printers tracking code helping the person paying for the book? (The query on the blog was about why the printers tracking code was on the back cover bit the car code wasn’t) If, as suggested, the book distributors have a convention as to where the ISBN code goes then that’s where it has to go. Are some of the printers you are using ones which don’t normally print books for distribution and sale? Again Neilsen states “Most bookshops have now installed electronic point of sale (EPOS) systems, which enable them to keep track of their sales and to re-order books by scanning the barcode. Some retailers refuse to accept books that are not bar coded. Although the barcode will be derived from the ISBN, the agency does not issue them. Probably the best person to speak to about bar coding is your printer, who may have the software required to convert the ISBN into a barcode.” Why not just make sure that
– all the books that don’t want bar codes get routed to the printers who don’t print bar codes?
– all the people who do want their books to have bar codes have their books sent to printers who have the software to produce the bar code?
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