The Death of Long Text Fiction

On paper, at least. Maybe even beyond that.

Because I wonder whether that really was it, and so we're kind of done, now. It's not just Kindle and Sony's Reader, or mobile phones becoming more competent reading devices: its how I see people interacting with their time.

Ten years ago, a London bus would have been full of people reading books. These days you're as likely to see people texting, watching a vidfeed or playing on their Nintendo DS. When people are at home, they have friends and family and washing up and things to do. Reading is generally the indulgence of dead time, and competition for that time is getting more and more intense.

Reading has to challenge--

Oh who are we kidding? It's not fighting. It's not getting up again. It's dead.

Dead. It's gone the way of young Victorian ladies learning to etch and play the guitar. It hasn't stopped moving, but as a hobby it is in a zombified state. J. K. Rowling may have played re-animatrix for the last few years, with the help of a lumpen Igor in the shape of Dan Brown, but it's dead.

Nobody is paying to read anymore.

Especially not you.

Capeesh?