Mark Burnett, of Survivor fame, has a new show coming this fall to CBS, called Gold Rush. Wired gives a good review of the new show, but seems to have missed the boat: Gold Rush is less about game mechanics, and more about employing Web2.0 principles.

A Recap:
Gold Rush is a new reality show in which viewers at home (that includes you), will all be able to participate in weekly attempts at finding stashes of hidden of real gold scattered throughout the United States of America. Clues will be given in the form of short video clips distributed through websites such as AOL network sites such as Moviefone and Mapquest.com, but also scattered throughout a number of CBS owned media properties, including prime time series, such as CSI, and of course, Survivor (of which Mark Burnett is the creator).

Sure, its a Buzzword, but …
I have to admit, when I heard the elevator pitch/press release a few months ago, my jaded genx heart got a little stoked. It sounded *cool*. Little tips through the Internet. EVERYONE could play? GOLD? (arrr!) .

Then it got me thinking how similar the game mechanics were to what I read and blog about almost every day — the Web2.0.

Now granted, the “Web2.0″ is a buzzword that people still argue over, but let’s examine what the Gold Rush’s own game mechanics involves against what we I commonly think of when we I think of the web2.0

Spot the Similarities:

1. Audience participation: Gold Rush’s principle allure is that anyone can win because everyone’s invited to play. With the evolution of Web applications and rich internet experiences, the Web2.0 is about getting people involved in a way that has never quite been done before.
2. Sharing of information: In order to win, players will need to collaborate. Burnett’s clues will be notoriously difficult to solve on your own; the presumption is that by working together groups of people will be able to solve the clues each week. In the Web2.0, collaboration is the grease with which web applications simply could not run, and is a fundamental underpinning of which they are built upon. Think Digg, or Del.icio.us. More to the point (Buzzword Alert!), it employs the Wisdom of Crowds to solve problems that no single person can answer correctly.
3. Always on / Always Available: Just as in the Web2.0, where all you’ll need is a browser to carry your presonal information, calendar, contacts, and rich media, so will Gold Rush employ the same principles. The game will be delivering information and tips throughout the day — not just prime time, but even during working hours.
4. New Interactivity of an “Old” Medium: Web applications are driving the Web2.0, which with the popularity of frameworks like Rails and new combinations of older programming and scripting technologies to create AJAX, is creating a new experience for Internet users. Gold Rush is taking television, through a cleverly constructed marketing/game mechanic, in a similar direction. It will force participants (likely, necessarily in teams), to not just watch passively their favourite programs, but actively — and looking for tidbits, clues and other morsels of information that can further their quest for the gold in any given week.
5. Use of Rich Media: Gold Rush will be distributing its clues not on paper, not through television clips but video clips on the Internet, through AOL managed properties. In this vein, it takes advantage of the proliferation of broadband, think: Youtube and all its clones.

As funny and improbable as it is to think of Mark Burnett as a game design auteur, its probably just as improbable to think of him as a bleeding edge web2.0 guru.

Well, as improbable as it may be, I think he’s unwillingly done it: mashed up a new reality show with the underlying mechanics of what’s currently driving all of the hoopla, reams of VC investment, and talks of a a bubble 2.0 …

The Web2.0.