Pulp magazines had more, shorter stories in them. I assume to maximise the brand recognition of the authors or characters (Continental Op) on the cover. Dickens’s magazines had like two stories on the go at a time. Potboilera rather than short. Pulp novels also were much shorter than the earlier style.
I also blame US newspapers and telegraphs for the vast improvement in literary style and form.
I think Defoe was paid, not by the page nor by the word, but rather by the number of pointless, tedious, disgusting pious god bothering interjections he managed to showhorn into his nasty exploitative apology text.
