ABSTRACT
This article has been prepared to help librarians and other information community members who are now using or plan to use ISSN registered by the National Serials Data Program (NSDP). This brief excursion into the policy and processing background of NSDP covers matters which may be of interest to users of the work performed by NSDP. An indication of NSDP’s sources for and scope of assignments prefaces comments on interpreting MARC records containing ISSN, looking up ISSN in bibliographic sources, finding the ISSN on publications, and assisting NSDP in the administration of the ISSN for U.S. serials.
Since they have been elaborated extensively elsewhere, this discussion does not describe the International Serials Data System (ISDS), NSDP’s functions and responsibilities within the ISDS and the U.S. bibliographic community, or the attributes and advantages of using the ISSN. 1
