“By 02050, an algorithm will receive a major multi-book publishing deal.”

Algorithmic attempts at writing fiction novels are crude today, but gradual improvements will see these works become nearly indistinguishable from those written by flesh-and-blood authors. In the distant future, more books will be written by code than by humans. Before this happens -- I contend by the year 02050 -- we will see an algorithm receive a major multi-book deal for works of fiction offered by a top publisher. Currently, procedurally generated works appear in financial sections and sports pages with the reader none the wiser. This will be true of novel-length fiction within thirty years.