Test Driving Brsts.com, Dutton’s Interactive Website to Promote, Prove Book

By David 

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Last Thursday, Dutton launched the interactive website for the book Bursts: The Hidden Pattern Behind Everything We Do, by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi, so we stopped by recently to give it a shot.

The premise is pretty simple: you see an e-book version of Bursts with most of the text blocked out. You can flip through the pages, but only a word or two on each page has been revealed so far. Visitors get to adopt one word, then guess at the others based on context and length (the word “a” is pretty obvious). Correct guesses score points, and high point-earners win signed copies of the book. So how did I do?


I ended up with the word “with,” on page 11. I then guessed at one word (incorrect) and then another (correct: the word was Until, and I guessed it because it was before “recently.”). After a few minutes of play, I totaled 177 points, which, I gathered, was fairly unremarkable. Though I didn’t stay long, it’s not hard to see how this could become addicting, especially when more of the words become visible and the text starts to become clearer. When there are only two or three words left in each sentence, it’ll be easier to guess them and rack up more points. And when it’s complete, you’ll be able to read the entire book online.

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When I tried it out last night, my word was the 791st to be adopted. By today, another 72 have been picked, leaving 83,639 “up for grabs.”

If it takes off, this is a clever way to get people thinking about the content of the book. It’s also, apparently, an example of Bursts‘ theory, “that despite the seeming randomness of human behavior, humans actually act in very predictable pattern.” That was from the press release, and here’s more about the website: “Brsts.com is a meticulously monitored experiment in the dynamics of human behavior. Merging together some of its most distinct influences-technology, social networking, economics and competition-with the numerous possibilities of written word, Barabasi predicts that once again the pattern behind everything we do will be revealed.”

Give it a shot and tell us what you think.