ISBN leads to incorrect citation

oturner · March 23, 2021

When I add a book of which I authored into my Zotero library, using the ISBN number, the publication year comes up incorrectly. I can obviously edit the year for my own reference list, but how can I report the problem and have it fixed centrally, so that anyone citing my work won't get the publication year wrong?

adamsmith · March 23, 2021

We'd have to see the ISBN. Zotero queries various library catalogs, so if an item has an incorrect date, that's coming from one of those.

oturner · March 23, 2021

Thanks. I took the ISBN from the publisher website (https://www.routledge.com/American-Images-of-China-Identity-Power-Policy/Turner/p/book/9781138682740), and it's this one:

9781138682740

The publication year enters into Zotero as 2016, but it should be 2014. Can the issue be fixed?

adamsmith · March 23, 2021

Data comes from here: http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/934677349 -- and I think this actually may be a 2016 (paperback?) edition. E.g. Amazon has this as 2016, too, with that ISBN:
https://www.amazon.com/American-Images-Routledge-Studies-Foreign/dp/1138682748

On the other hand, if you're using the original hardcover ISBN
9780415659550 you get data from the Library of Congress with the correct publication date.

adamsmith · March 23, 2021

From the page you link to:

ISBN 9781138682740
Published March 3, 2016 by Routledge
226 Pages

oturner · March 23, 2021

Yes it says 2016 which is wrong. So it sounds like the problem isn't with Zotero, but with the ISBN provided by the publisher (since the information is correct elsewhere)

adamsmith · March 23, 2021

The problem isn't with Zotero, no, but I don't think it's with the publisher, either. THe problem is that you're using the ISBN for the paperback edition that was published in 2016

oturner · March 23, 2021

Ah yes, I didn't realise that hardbacks and paperbacks had different ISBNs. Thanks, that does seem to explain it.