Remember Amazon’s Kindle Singles? (You might recall that MobyLives had some fun with the idea earlier this fall.) Upon its announcement it seemed like a contrived way to anticipate and corner a market before a healthy, robust, and, dare we say, organic new ecosystem of short, electronic writing had a chance to be born. Paul Oliver put it nicely in his critique of the venture when he said that “like everything Amazon does, the Single is meant to compete with other services as much as render one for its users.”

Still, the idea that e-readers and tablets provide a new, potentially profitable way of distributing short works without the prohibitive costs associated with printing is pretty irresistible. They may also present the best counter-argument to the notion that content produced for an electronic medium ought to be free.

Now a new wave of young, media savvy British publishers are creating ventures devoted exclusively to the proposition. Yesterday, the Independent ran a story about former HarperCollins editor Claire Hey‘s new venture called, appropriately, Shortlist Press. Shortlist Press is set to launch just before Christmas with a few established British authors as well as newcomers (Nadifa Mohamed, Laura Dockrill, and Elizabeth Jenner provide the first offerings) and is seeking to put its mark on the zeitgeist. This from the Independent:

The culture of e-books is at a critical point in Britain and Christmas sales of the new Amazon Kindle are widely expected to be a tipping point. Sales of the iPad and other tablet formats also make the digital consumption of fiction a more attractive pastime. Although most British newspapers continue to provide their journalism for free, and out-of-copyright fiction can be accessed online without charge, the culture of piracy that has beset the music business is not entrenched in literature. Now is the time to set down some rules that work for everyone, says Hey, 31. “I’m keen to offer stories that people can buy affordably, but at the same time send out the message that these stories have a value.”

But is buying a short story a la carte really the equivalent of a 99 cent download from iTunes? Should it be?

No doubt it’s going to take some time to evolve. There are certainly some really smart people thinking deeply about what the future of literature will look like. And maybe the short story will be the new mp3. Still, the valuations currently under discussion seem a little weird and rely on this notion that a low enough price will result in the kind of sales in volume to justify the lower price. Maybe that’s right. Let’s just hope the ecosystem that does emerge is sustainable and creates a space for creative and interesting work to thrive.

Either way, if the Independent is right, all the cool kids are gonna have some kind of device to read on that’s not a stodgy old book: “There is an appetite among young people for reading literature if it can be consumed on digital devices they are comfortable being seen with.”