Will we ever read fiction online?

Over the last 10 years we have seen the internet transform or obsolete industries that haven't had any major changes in decades. We've watched magazines and newspapers lose circulation as readers abandoned their dead tree publishing for their online edition. We've watched the RIAA get dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century. Movie rentals can finally happen online. Youtube like sites could be the replacement for "channel surfing". We can make phone call over the internet. However, inspite of all of this, there is almost no market for reading fiction online.

This fact has lead many to suggest that we'll never read fiction online. Others will claim that we will, but it'll be limited to short stories or flash fiction. Based on the continued failure of electronic book devices to bring us constantly failing ebooks, it's not surprising that many want to throw in the towel on long form online fiction. I, however, am still optimistic about blog fiction someday going mainstream. I think it's only a matter of time until something evolves to the point where we're reading fiction online.

As Novelr points out, it would appear that blog fiction is perfect for short stories and short serials. At least we can all agree on that. You could read a blog fiction just like any other. Subscribe to the feed and when there's a new entry go read it. One entry by itself is easy to read once in a while. The problem is that once we've written a lot of posts, people will want to read our fictional blogs from the start. That can be a lot of on screen text to read "for fun".

It's that last point I think is the only thing holding back online fiction. It is just hard to read a lot of text on the computer - it can strain the eyes. It's a lot easier to read a book in bed than a laptop screen. It's more relaxing to sit in your recliner than your computer chair. So, to get more people to read our fictional blogs we have to ask this question:

How do we easily beam our online content to a device that's affordable, portable, and pleasurable to read?

I think that once that question is answered, online fiction will explode. Think of all the possibilities:

• When we find a new fictional blog that we like, we can just enter the url into our bookreader and go to the beach and read its archives.
• Free ad-supported eBooks. Where the ads are imbedded in the text. Or you can buy the ad-free version.
• ebooks that have a 2.0 version instead of 2nd publishing
• Dozens of other innovations no one has dreamed up yet

As far as "a device that's affordable, portable, and pleasurable to read" I can't really help with that. However, I am a programmer so maybe I can help with "easily beam our online content" part. Another goal I've set for myself is to look up and maybe develop tools that can format our blogs so that they can be read by existing (and crappy) eReaders and other mobile devices. That way, once someone engineers the fictional device described above, we can be ready to fill it with our awesome fictional blogs. Also, maybe, we can help beam content to the existing crap we have today.

Any pointers or suggestions of where to start looking would be more than helpful.