I'm curious how much this is the cause or effect, though?

The publishers have been saying that their ability to promote books has drastically reduced with the internet, along with changes in reading and information habits.

It seems like a book needs a far bigger push today to rise above the noise of the internet (and people's over-abundance of content to consume), and this unfortunately meant that small publishers struggled unless they "joined together" to make a bigger push.

There's extremely small (self published) books and extremely large hits, but the middle is increasingly less viable, it seems. Similar to films.

Correct. That's why even though the specific complaint from the article no longer applies, and small-volume books are easier than ever to publish, things are still shit, only in different ways. Consolidation in a market is just about the worst way to run anything; all the worst elements of a government agency and a profit-seeking business with none of the moderating factors of democracy or competition.

It's almost like competition is critical for a healthy marketplace! (Seriously, I _don't_ understand why this is such a hard concept for a lot of people to understand...)