According to The Bookseller: Neil Blair, partner at the Christopher Little Agency (CLA) which represents Rowling, said the agency was “currently considering all the options and opportunities that this evolving space provides”. The agency was “actively” looking, whereas previously it had just been “monitoring the developing area”, he said. That would indeed be a bit of magic should it happen....

We all know that the so-called “paperless office” turned out…not to be. In fact, computers caused the use of more paper than ever before. There was even a paper shortage a few years back, though it may be stretching a point to tie this to paper use brought on by computers. But it looks as if the predominance of electronic media—websites, electronic newspapers, and, yes, e-books—is now doing what the “paperless office” could not, cutting down on the use of paper significantly. And this is having some unanticipated consequences. In particular, it could quite possibly cause a shortage...

Sam Jordison on the Guardian Books Blog meditates on the eco-friendliness of e-books. He mentions a study on the Kindle that estimates a Kindle produces “roughly 168 kg” of carbon dioxide during its lifetime, whereas a single book produces about 7.46 kg—meaning that a Kindle equals about 22.5 books. So once a Kindle has kept someone from buying 23 paper books, the carbon dioxide savings begin. The author of the study also claims that "a physical book purchased by a person driving to the bookstore creates twice the emissions of a book purchased online." She also notes that...