Here's an interesting article on the state of the book publishing industry, from the British perspective.

With its over-educated, overworked, underpaid legions, publishing is an industry bedevilled by pessimism. This pessimism blinds people to the fact that we are living in a golden age of book publishing in which quantity and quality rival anything in the past, in which books have never been so well published and in which they occupy a more boisterously visible place in the general culture than ever before.

Have a look.

It's from The Edge, which really is a great place to find interesting stuff.