Writing in the Independent recently, Mark Booth, Director at Century Publishing, laid out his vision for the future of publishing.  A “great new literary form” is apparently heading our way.

He is right, of course, at least in principle. It has been said since the dawn of the concept of the e-book, but finally we are beginning to sense the promise of electronic distribution peeking its head above the horizon. And there are already new forms of distribution and audience building which are still as yet to register on both author and publisher radars (PodShowPress, for example).

Booth continues in a spray of excited anticipation:

[this will take on the net's] wild frontier spirit, its intellectual risk-taking, its two fingers at academic control freakery

Oh dear.
Mark, this is 2008, not 1999, the rest of us have already outgrown this impression of the internet frontier - the dot-bomb helps, did you miss that? And “intellectual risk-taking”? I guess you mean that most of what the net offers in this new literary form is a greater dumbing down than we already see on many of our bookshelves. Both continues the article in this manner and completely loses me once he feels he must mention Facebook - clearly because he feels he must as he is, after all, talking about the internet.

What this attitude highlights is the naivety the publishing industry has about the promise and prospects presented by this second life of the online world. I feel as though publishing has barely woken up and noticed that everyone else has been forging ahead, breaking new ground, and changing our perceptions of what is possible. Publishing is, and will continue to be, playing catch-up, while readers and authors are taking control.