Kevin Kelly has posted a detailed explanation of the process by which you can get your self-published DVD, CD or book listed on Amazon. It's a great idea for those evangelical, get-the-message-out micro-publishing projects that have more than 10 or 20 potential customers — you can print a couple hundred media objects at your local print-shop for a fraction of what a vanity press will charge, and then turn over all the post-office and payment crap to Amazon.
1 Get an ISBN (for a book), or a UPC (for a CD or DVD). For one book it costs $125, for one CD, $55, for one DVD, $89.
2 Get a bar code based on the ISBN or UPC. Costs $10, or may be included in UPC.
3 Sign up with Amazon, $30 per year.
4 Duplicate your stuff; include the bar code on the outside.
5 Ship two copies to Amazon
6 Send cover scan
7 Track sales
8 Resgister it (optional)
(via Paul Boutin)
Update: Jim Cowling sez, "Canadian publishers, including self-publishers, can get ISBNs for free by going to the Library and Archives Canada website."
Update 2: Viveka sez, "people in any country can find out how to get an ISBN through the alphabetical list on this page at the ISBN international site. For example, ISBNs in Australia are administered by Thorpe, and cost $33 each once you pay a usury of registration and block-allocation fees. I'm using 'usury' just as a collective noun for fees here, not as any imputation on the fine people at Thorpe, who must be paying their database admins by the keystroke."
