I’ll catch you in 2014 for the ‘No One Could’ve Seen *That* Coming’ Party.

Crystal gazing for 2013:

1. iBooks Author. This will be the year of iBooks Author, especially on the iPad mini. Apple are investing in the platform and as it improves we’ll see a corresponding increase in quality investment from publishers to justify a higher price.

Moving away from iOS we’ll be seeing some new premium reading experiences specifically targeted at the high-end Kindle stable of devices – they’ll now have the market share to justify the increased investment.

2. Data driven narrative design. As much as possible publishers will take control of granular analytics data (borrowing a page from game development) to inspire, improve and iterate certain titles. Books as a service. There will be mixed success, but some will be very good at it by 2014.

3. Blurred edges. The edges of what a publisher is and does will continue to blur. In response to yet more niche publishers and start-ups competing for attention on ‘their’ turf we’ll see a surge in entrepreneurial behaviour and collaborations from the major publishers. Large-scale, commercially successful digital hits will become far more common.

Read the full post with a raft of much smarter contributors on The Literary Platform: A Year in Digital Publishing and What To Expect in 2013