blogs get ISSN numbers

Is Blogging Serializing?

Posted on: April 26th, 2007 by Matt Raymond

I got an email this morning from a colleague in the Office of Communications, who said that she was speaking to our “guru of ISSN numbers.” Here is the upshot:

Today she told me that after much debate, catalogers had decided that corporate blogs published regularly are in fact serial publications and therefore should have an ISSN number. The Library should be a model for all catalogers, she said. She promised to read and assess your blog and communicate further. Many bloggers have been requesting ISSN numbers. You may already have an ISSN number.

I thought it worth throwing this one out to the larger community, especially given our growing librarian and cataloger readership.

Should this blog and others have an ISSN number? What are the pluses and minuses?

I can certainly see the pride of having an official “number.” But I also know the blogosphere is, by and large, a notoriously independent — and sometimes cantankerous — place. Would bloggers chafe at such an identifier? What guidelines should govern who does or doesn’t get assigned an ISSN? Do any blogs already have an ISSN?

from http://www.loc.gov/blog/