Should we fear the e-book or welcome it with open downloads? Simon Cornish reflects on the face of publishing to come.

'E-book' is a seductive thing to say; the sound itself conjures up a comfortable notion: a book, but without all the paper. Easy. None of that hassle of visiting a bookstore or waiting for delivery; you can have it instantly, straight to your computer screen or handheld gizmo. There is a lot of excitement about e-books, and as writers we need to consider how the paradigm of the book itself may evolve as a result. How will e-books change the way we write, and how our work is marketed, accessed and read?

This change is already happening. Perhaps the onset of e-publishing will be the panacea the publishing industry needs at a time of closing bookstores, offering opportunnities to reach readers directly. Although in the process publishers will inevitably find themselves locking horns with established web-development companies, or worse, software and search giants like Microsoft and Google. And what of the prolific hoards of the self-published, poised on the borders of civilisation ready to sweep away all in their path in an orgy of trivia and unedited mediocrity?

It is likely that the publishing industry will be plagued by the same sort of rights issues, over illegal downloads and file sharing, that the music industry has complained of since the inception of digital music publishing. To release an e-book as a file is to invite copying. The reader should not be blamed for this; there is little perceived value in a file once it has been read when compared to its paper equivalent. Just as we might give or lend a book we have read to a friend, we will do the same with a file, but this file is a clone, and as easy to send to ten friends as one, who in turn might make ten copies for their friends, and so on. This is an issue that needs to be addressed if the publishing industry is not to risk collapsing altogether. Publishers and writers alike need to re-examine their approach to how work is published, and how they will manage the asset once it is within the public domain.

When was the last time you reached for a reference book before you searched the internet on a subject? Reference books and academic publications of the not-so-distant future may not contain page numbers or contents pages; instead they could be collections of browser-optimised information, images, links and video connected only by search terms – put in the subject and up pops a list of appropriate pages. But why stop there? Why not search all material pertaining to that subject? Does anyone doubt that Google, with its increasing library of online books, will not eventually get its way, so that books are no longer be seen as whole volumes, but information to be plundered by search engines. As Geoffrey Nunberg writes: 'it generally talks about books as just another kind of information resource to be incorporated into Greater Google.'

Cookbooks are a good example, there is a likelihood they will not be published as whole books, but as individual pages; searchable by ingredients, name, region, season, even colour. The same could be true for self-help books and many other genres of information-based non-fiction. Once this becomes the norm, customers will quickly stop buying longer volumes that cost fifteen pounds when they can download the information they want for five pence, or for nothing. Bad? Perhaps, but there could be advantages; publishers or search engines could charge a tiny fee for each page viewed, or pages may earn revenue from subject-focused advertising.

Google’s recent decision to work with newspaper publishers to limit free reading is just a start, and the implications for the powers this may give Google are revolutionary. Another benefit may see authors no longer required to write a whole book before it is published, but posting each page as it is written, blog fashion, and getting paid from the outset. Work then is no longer set, but can be amended or updated continually, keeping it relevant and linked in with current events and fashions.

If publishers switch their mindset so that the written product they publish is not sold as a unit, or book in the old sense – to be handed over to the reader as a copyable file – and instead retain control by merely loaning the readers the right to view the material via apps on their computers, i-phones, or e-readers, then they may turn the industry around. The responsibility of publishers will be to ensure that the links and  metadata that enable search engines to find the relevant pages operates and remains effective, but that the copyable part of the files never actually leave their servers.

Novels will most likely suffer; as Ben Macintyre's recent Times article 'The Internet is Killing Storytelling' indicates: in a culture of byte sized appetites, readers may lose their taste for longer works of fiction. But even then, this may revive a taste for short stories or the type of serialised novellas that once graced the pages of magazines. Publishers could offer print-on-demand services for anyone old fashioned enough to want hardcopy.

If it seems like the end for traditional books, new opportunities will surely emerge for writers and those who appreciate good writing. As readers begin to rely less on supermarkets or the increasingly fewer bookchains on the high street because of the limited selection on their shelves, so they will migrate online, attracted by the broader choice. This brings opportunities for  more eclectic or first-time writers, whose work may not have mass appeal but possibly has great merit. Who knows what new writing forms will emerge: online groups of live storytellers, each writing a character part; mobile speech-to-text allowing someone to describe their experiences as they see it? If publishing is to survive the next decade, we must learn to adapt. To stay still is to stagnate, to change is to evolve. If Dickens were alive today I would like to think he would not be dreading electronic publishing at all. Lead on I say, lead on.

"Ghost of the Future!" he exclaimed, "I fear you more than any spectre I have seen. But as I know your purpose is to do me good, and as I hope to live to be another man from what I was, I am prepared to bear you company, and do it with a thankful heart. Will you not speak to me?" It gave him no reply. The hand was pointed straight before them. "Lead on," said Scrooge. "Lead on.”
A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens.