Google’s brisk march to world domination has largely been built on Adwords. I know you understand the concept behind Adwords, but just in case there’s someone from North Dakota reading this, let me explain. Adwords shows you contextually relevant ads: ads based on the words you entered in Google search, or on the text of the blog you’re currently reading, or the email you’re currently writing, the thoughts you’re currently thinking, and any number of other creepy scenarios. Every time you click on one of those ads, the advertiser pays a little money to Google, and you benefit because presumably you’re finding out about stuff that you’re genuinely interested in. So everybody wins.

From Russian publisher Eksmo comes a strange and/or brilliant perversion of Google Adwords in print. That’s right – I said in print. Eksmo’s ads appear in books. Printed works of fiction. Works of fiction that you paid money for. A scenario:
You’re reading the latest Vasily Golovachev book. Two characters in this book are talking about the Kuiper Belt. You’re not sure if you remember exactly what the Kuiper Belt is, and you’re curious–not curious enough to get up from your chair and Google the phrase “Kuiper Belt” per se, but curious enough to send a text message to a number printed in the book you just bought. You’re deftly balancing curiosity and sloth, and you’re afraid an encounter with the internet could upset that balance. So you send a text message–a text message that costs money–and your curiosity is satisfied, in 160-letter, text message bursts.

It worked on the internet. Will it work in real life?