This is part 2 of 4 in a series of posts about books, and genres, and all those tricky categories that creative people have to deal with. Publication, sales, and distribution are parts of any business, even when the business is selling art. When it’s art, you have to deal with categories and genres. You can’t get away from it. You have to answer the question, where does my work fit in? In which genre does it fit?
Previous post: Part 1 – You need genres
DDCs and LLCNs (and these are a few of my least favourite things)
Books and publications are sorted and ordered in collections, for instance in libraries and in book stores, by allocating a DDC number to each item, which indicates what sort of information it contains, or what it is.
You have probably never given this a moment’s thought, but in many books published in the USA, on the Copyright page, it refers to the Library of Congress Catalogue number, or the LC/LCC number (LCCN). That is because a copy of the book is kept in a library (yes, in an actual library) specifically, the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. The Library of Congress (LC) number relates to where it fits into the global information spectrum, according to the DDC – and literally, where it fits on the shelves in the library.
For example, the Library of Congress Catalog (LCC) number on the Copyright page of Matthew McConaughey’s book, Poems and Prayers, is broken down into DDC 811/.6-dc23/eng/20250611. Correctly – DDC 811 is the Dewey Decimal number for Poetry.
The Library of Congress is the largest library in the world with millions of items stored, in a variety of forms and formats. Each working day the Library receives some 15,000 items, and adds more than 10,000 items to its collections.
Anything that exists in this world and that is classified as a thing that contains information; a book, record, film, magazine, document, baseball card, music score – you name it, is in the LC, or can be submitted for inclusion in the LLC. And you can search its databases online to find any information you want, for free. Moreover, the items in the LC are in the major world languages, not just in English.
RANDOM RABBIT-HOLE: I have only checked USA-based cataloging systems. Based on what I’ve seen in music publication, I assume that copyright systems and laws in different countries, all around the world, have their equivalents to the USA’s systems, and that all the systems are connected and globally accessible.
The code identifies the thing – ISBNs
Along with the LLC number and the DDC code, books – even liner notes for music albums – can get an International Standard Book Number (ISBN). You’ll see the ISBN on the Copyright page of Matthew McConaughey’s book, above. What this means is that your creation gets a series of codes or numbers allocated to it, which determines what it is, who made it, and precisely what it’s called.
The ISBN that your book is assigned, is a unique 13-digit identifier for books, used worldwide. It acts as a distinct product number for publishers, libraries, and booksellers to manage ordering, listing, and inventory for specific book editions.
Identifying inventory refers, again, to what something is, and who created it, or who owns the copyright. I came to the conclusion that much of the systems for genre classification, has to do with who owns or owns which part of the product. To protect the ownership of a work, requires a complete legal framework, which includes the means to define the ownership. The means include these codes and numeral identifiers. (If you don’t care about who is the owner of the thing you have created, then don’t bother with the DDC, LLC, or ISBN.)
RANDOM RABBIT-HOLE: I thought that is interesting, because copyright is “…the exclusive legal right protecting original literary, dramatic, musical, and artistic works, allowing creators to control how their work is reproduced, published, or performed. It arises automatically upon creation of a tangible work—not just ideas—and generally lasts for the author’s life plus 70 years.” Therefore, copyright pertains to ownership of the work. The copyrighted work is the creator’s intellectual property. And this comes from way back from Graeco-Roman law, from which modern Western law developed. Today’s Western law is heavily structured around the concepts of private property and ownership, relying on abstract legal constructs like contracts, corporations, and property rights. These systems define rights, obligations, and legal relationships. There you have it. It’s all about my stuff versus your stuff and you keeping your paws off my stuff! My goodness, it’s all just so…un-Buddhist.
Ugh. Numbers.
Why is the ISBN a number? (I am a badly-educated Bear of Little Brain, because this is a case of TIL…) Well, numbers are precise. You cannot argue with numbers. A numerical system is more understandable than a system using words because those can be vague or have multiple meanings. The numerical or numeral system that I, and you, and most of the people in the world use, is the Hindu-Arabic Decimal System, with the numbers zero to nine, that look like they do. It is a base-ten (decimal) system. The Hindu-Arabic numeral system, which dates from 600 CE, is used and understood everywhere.
It is the default numerical system used in the fields of digital technology, mathematics, engineering, science, and business, because it is efficient and universal. While there are languages that use different symbols and characters for some numbers, such as a space or period rather than a decimal comma, it’s almost 100% certain that the written numerals that you use every day is Hindu-Arabic digits, in Roman script, wherever you are.
This is even when you are writing everything else in your own language or script, such as Mandarin Chinese or Russian. Did you know this? I think it’s fascinating where the things come from that we take for granted.
An ISBN protects your copyright and categorizes your book
The ISBN number allocated to your book is another way that you can protect your copyright in your work. The number means that the creation is yours, you made it, and you own it.
If you do not register your book and get an ISBN number, or get assigned a number by a publisher, it means that you do not have that defence (the legal leg to stand on), if someone plagiarizes your book, or takes your book, sticks it in a different category under their own name, and sells it. Or if someone or some firm accuses you, the original creator, of copyright or trademark infringement of the work of some fictitious author. This latter instance happens often to creators of original materials, believe me.
This type of “lawfare”, to use a term that’s become popular in the USA, is a scourge in any art form, and it is particularly virulent and problematic on video platforms. It’s a scam, but the only way to deal with it is to register your product and thereby officially prove that you made it and own it, from the date of registration. It happened once to me on Vimeo, and I threw all the codes I had at them and the issue was resolved immediately. I have codes coming out of my ears, an entire database.
The systems in music
In music, there are a couple of systems that are equivalent to what you get in book publishing.
One is the P line (or ℗ line) that you, as the creator of the music recording, completes when you release your music on a streaming platform, such as SoundCloud, or iTunes.
It is a one-liner statement that represents the phonographic copyright, which signifies legal ownership of the specific sound recording (the master) of a song. While it is a great convenience to be signed to a music publisher that will do all this arduous admin stuff for you, it probably also means that they own the copyright to your recordings.
On the left, is a random Apple music album, with the P line given at the bottom of the product image. Bet you’ve never given that a moment’s thought.
The equivalent to the ISBN is the UPC (Universal Product Code), a unique 12-digit barcode identifier for a physical or digital music release (album, EP, or single), that is allocated by the publisher and distributor of your music. The UPC indicates worldwide ownership.
Music distributors and sellers also require you to register an ISRC number for every product. ISRC (International Standard Recording Code) is a unique, 12-character alphanumeric “digital fingerprint” assigned to specific sound recordings and music videos. It acts as a permanent identifier.
You apply personally for an ISRC alphabetical code that is unique and exclusively yours, and use this code, plus its numeric extensions, for every recording you make. You have to keep tabs of the ISRCs you allocate to each musical work. In Canada, you can get ISRC codes for free directly from CONNECT Music Licensing, which acts as the national agency.
LAST RANDOM RABBIT-HOLE: I’ve figured out the copyright codes, registration systems, and genre classification for books and music. I’ve briefly, in the past, got a taste of how that works in fine art and photography. It was mind-boggling, and has to do with using things like visible watermarks, managed image resolution, and copyright metadata embedded into the image file. It’s whole different kettle of fish, but it convinced me that I’d rather not sell my artwork online.
SEVEN CIRCUMSTANCES 
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