I have been trying to list a bunch of books and found three time so far, a trend that when I have a book in hand with an ISBN 10 and try to put it in, a different book comes up. Then  for the book that I don't have, in that book's data there is an ISBN 13 then the ISBN 10 doesn't match. I thought the last digits of the ISBN 13 were to match that books ISBN 10.

In other words, some books in the system have a right ISBN 13 but a wrong ISBN 10 and in reality that ISBN 10 is attached to a completely different book.

I am faced with listing the book as if it has no ISBN. Or putting the book to the side to wait to see if the PBS system gets corrected.

Note the new "edit book data" feature does not allow us to change ISBNs. I did read the FAQ and it directed me to send a note to the developers or owners, and I did that.

I was wondering if others noticed this?

Nope, the last 10 digits of the ISBN-13 do NOT always match the 10-digit ISBN.

The last digit is usually different--they call it a "check digit" or something like that, and there is a complicated formula for figuring it out that I ran across on the internet.

If the ISBN-10 is 0-xx-xxxxxx-y  then the ISBN-13 will be 978-0-xx-xxxxxx-z. In other words, the first 9 digits of the ISBN-10 are digits 4 through 12 of the ISBN-13. As Liese said, the last digit is a checksum and it will be different.

I thought each ISBN-10 was unique to that book. Is that not true? I have multiple books in my hand with ISBN-10's but the PBS system has those numbers linked to very different titles.

My only option at this point is to enter a book WITH an ISBN as a book WITHOUT an ISBN. However that will make it harder for those using a wish list or looking up books by titles to find my book that does have an ISBN but is in the PBS system as having no ISBN. SIGH. I am confused.

If your 10-digit ISBNs bring up the right book (ISBN-10 matches, title, author, binding type all match), just post it.

If they don't you have to enter them as non-ISBN items.

Curse the pubs who throw ISBNs around like they're nothing! :)

Yeah, checksum, right...that's what I think I meant...?   Cathy, you are much more techie than I.  :)

I've had a couple older romance books that I got in a box lot at an auction with ISBN's, but when I put in the ISBN, it came up a newer book that was completely different from what I had.  Do ISBN's get re-used after so long?  I wouldn't think so, but that's what it looks like here.

-Layne

I received an email from PBS stating the bottom line is I have to input the book as if without an ISBN even though it does have an ISBN. They directed me to this FAQ which I had not seen before. This FAQ says the same thing (and more).

http://www.paperbackswap.com/help/search.php?terms=%22Solutions+to+Common+Book+Posting+Problems%22+