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Publishers Frequently Asked Questions for eBooks Corporation
Summary FAQ List 
General
Application
Using the Publisher Interface
Metadata Requirements
File Requirements
General
About eBooks Corporation
Founded by Stephen Cole, Australian bookseller and lifetime bibliophile, eBooks
Corporation is an Australian company with a global focus. eBooks Corporation
has specialized in the production and distribution of digital books since 1997,
and launched one of the world's first ebook stores (eBooks.com) in 2000. We
have long-standing, close working relationships with Adobe, Palm, Microsoft
and other stakeholders in the ebook industry.
eBooks Corporation has:
- distribution agreements with over 150 publishers globally
- an extensive and rapidly growing database of digital books
- proven commercial success in the digital publishing market
- extensive specialist expertise in acquiring, creating, securing, managing and distributing digital books
- a wide network of partners in the publishing, education and technology sectors
Does Ebooks Corporation have a library
offering?
In collaboration with leading university and research libraries and with a
core group leading academic publishers, Ebooks Corporation has created eBook
Library (EBL), a best of practice software platform which will deliver our
rapidly expanding catalogue of ebooks to academic and research libraries. Launched
in Spring 2004, EBL is currently acquiring STM content and would be pleased
to talk to you if you think your titles may be of interest. Feel free to contact
us at publishers@ebookscorporation.com to
hear more.
About eBooks.com
eBooks.com, the world's first comprehensive ebookstore, was launched in September
2000. It is now the leading specialist ebookstore on the web, selling whole
books, chapters and pages of books. eBooks.com enables customers to keyword
search through the entire text of all books in our database and to preview a
limited number of pages before purchase. If you are keen to see your titles available
from www.eBooks.com, please complete
an application form.
What is Pi?
Publisher Interface (Pi) is an interface which has been designed to easily
enable eBooks Corporation publishers to upload new titles and metadata, manage
their inventory and access sales data. A login and username for the Publisher
Interface will be issued to all publishers who have completed an application
form, been accepted as a new publisher and have executed the Ebooks Corporation
Publisher Distribution Agreement.
Application
How do I make my titles available through eBooks.com or EBL (eBookLibrary)?
If you would like your titles available through either of these, please complete
an application form at http://publishers.ebookscorporation.com/application.asp and
an eBooks Corporation representative will contact you shortly.
Are there any upfront fees associated with making our titles available through Ebooks Corporation?
No.
Does Ebooks Corporation accept titles from individual authors?
The overhead for managing an individual author account is massive and makes
it difficult for us to provide the same level of service that an author would
experience if they were to work with us through an agent, a publisher or an
aggregator who can better cater for the author's needs and provide us with
more titles for the same overhead. For this reason, we have rationalized our
licensing activities to focus on publishers, rather than authors and work through
the traditional supply chain with publishers or aggregators.
Do our books need to be in digital form when we submit them?
Yes. For more information about how your ebook files should be formatted,
see
"What specifications do our files need to conform to?" in "File Requirements" below.
Using the Publisher Interface
How do I log in to the Publisher Interface?
After your application has been approved, you will be issued with a unique
username and password. Using these, you can then log in to the Publisher Interface
site.
How do I access the Publisher Interface ftp site to upload my titles?
You cannot log in to the Publisher ftp site with a web browser. You will need to use an ftp client such as ftp explorer. It can be downloaded by clicking on the following link:
http://www.ftpx.com/download.html
An Ebooks Corporation representative will supply you with your username and password
to access our ftp site.
What do I do if I have forgotten my Pi or ftp usernames and passwords?
If you have misplaced or forgotten your username or password, let us know at publishers@ebookscorporation.com and we will reissue these to you.
Do I need to change the settings on my computer to upload new titles?
Please enable cookies and disable pop-up blockers on your browser.
How do I make changes to the Defaults data that I have already entered?
Enter the Default area by choosing the Options tab, then click on the Defaults
button. Please note: Most defaults are not retrospective. Changes to defaults
affects all titles uploaded from that point onwards. If you want the change
to the default to affect existing data then you will need to alert an Ebooks
Corporation representative.
If I make an error when entering a title’s DRM settings, how can it be changed afterwards?
Please contact us outlining the error and we will make the specific change
for you. DRMs are specified in the “Options” area under the “Defaults” tab after
login to Pi. If you change your DRM settings here, the changes will not be retrospective.
If all titles need to be changed, contact us directly.
Can I upload just one format for a title initially and then come back to upload the additional formats at a later date?
Yes. You can add further formats for a title as they become available and provided your metadata has been configured as per our specifications (see the “Documents” area of Pi after login) the original format and the additional formats will “find” one another.
How do I change details on a title which is in my queue?
Details on titles which are still in the queue cannot be changed. Once the title is live, complete with file etc, changes can be made.
My “To-Do list”, asks for titles to be uploaded. Are these titles that you have received metadata for but no files?
That is correct. You will need to upload the ebook files for these titles to the ftp site.
I do not use ISBNs for my titles. Where an ISBN is not used for a title, what should be put into the mandatory ISBN field?
An alternate code of 3 letters followed by 7 numbers will be assigned to you. The numbers enumerate and start at 0000000. eg. ABC0000000, ABC0000001, ABC0000002, ABC0000003 etc. Please contact us for your three letter prefix.
Do I need to use the “Enter New Title” interface every time I add metadata for a new title?
You only need to use this function if you are adding a single title. The “Enter
New Title” interface is most appropriate when you are adding metadata for a
small number of titles. Where a large number of titles are ready for upload
simultaneously we recommend that you use the bulk upload facility to provide
your metadata using an XML file.
Should the publication date field be entered as the actual date of publication for books that we published months or even years ago?
Yes. Please enter the publication date as it is important for our records.
When entering BISAC/BIC codes for a title, do I choose either BISAC or BIC, or use both?
Please enter as many codes as possible, to ensure greater search functionality. The greater the degree of granularity the more likely it is that our retail and library customers will be able to locate and purchase your titles.
Metadata Requirements
What formats can we submit our metadata in?
Ebooks Corporation accepts metadata as Onix, or individual title forms entry. All
of these can be uploaded or filled in from your Pi account.
Should we sell our ebooks at a discount to the traditional retail price?
Pricing is in the publisher's hands, but most publishers sell their ebooks at a meaningful discount to the hardcopy price to cater for consumer expectations.
We don't have rights clearance on the cover art for some of our titles. Will this be a problem?
We strongly recommend that you only make titles available with the rights cleared on cover art and all other images in the body of the text as this directly impacts on marketability and sales.
Does the metadata for the bulk upload need to be formatted in a particular way?
Please use title case for titles and authors. Do not use upper or lower case only. Further specifications for the bulk upload formatting requirements can be found in the “Documents” area of Pi after login.
My “To-Do list” tells me that I have titles with incomplete metadata. What does this mean?
Imperfect or insufficient metadata has been supplied for those titles listed. Please refer to the metadata specifications documentation located under the “Documents” tab, or contact us for details.
File Requirements
What specifications do our files need to conform to?
To view a copy of our file preparation guidelines please go to our file preparation guidelines.
Can you recommend a conversion company to work with?
http://www.pubdimensions.com
I would like to send you my ebook files on CD or DVD, rather than using the ftp site. Is this OK?
If the number of titles you are uploading is less than 100, the best approach to submitting your titles would be by uploading directly to our publishers’ ftp site. For titles in excess of 100, submission by CD or DVD would be ideal, as it makes the process quicker and simpler for you. If the number exceeds 1000, please contact us to discuss the most seamless way to arrange the file transfer.
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