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“The Tipping Point was one of those books that had been on my radar for a long time, but I'd just never gotten around to reading it. It's often shelved under "Marketing" or maybe "Business" in your local megabookstore, but after reading it I'm not quite sure that's right. It's a book about how social, informational, and traditional epidemics gestate and move through groups. Among other things, Gladwell answers questions about why fashion trends happen, why certain children's television shows succeed, and why teenagers smoke. To explain all this, he sets up a framework involving four groups of people: Mavens, Connectors, and Salespeople. He then explains how other elements come into play, like the power of context and the stickiness of a message.
Gladwell makes this all this interesting and fun to read through a light but dignified style, and by liberal use of colorful examples and stories. What I think the author's greatest strength is, though, is how he takes things that we all already know or think --like the importance of the social environment or how we always tend to go to the same people for advice on certain things-- and legitimizes them by citing real, scientific studies. The treat for me is that many of these citations come from psychology, which is as you may know an area of no small interest to me.
While it's far from impossible to poke holes in many of Gladwell's claims (e.g., he overemphasizes how teen suicide "Mavens" and "Connectors" provide implicit permission for other kids to kill themselves while ignoring other, more powerful factors), it's a genuinely thought-provoking work. I'm definitely going to pick up his other book, Blink.”
jmadigan wrote this review Tuesday, July 17 2007.
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