Comments | clubbook: The Tipping Point

poets_hand in clubbook

The Tipping Point

Jul 10, 2006 21:01

When I read non-fiction, the thought that always goes through my egotistical head is "how does this apply to me?" At first I was put off by the book because I thought it was basically a motivational sales manual--a "how to" on selling stuff. But as I got further into it, I started getting interested in his theories a little more, and wondering ( Read more... )

Comments 5

joyce July 11 2006, 11:33:08 UTC

I won't bore you with how I went through and applied all of his rules to how this event became so big in just one year's planning

Actually, I think that would be terribly interesting to see, if you don't mind typing it up. :)

(More later; no 'net at work, whee!)

joyce July 13 2006, 11:15:29 UTC

You know, I was think about this last night, and LJ is an excellent example of some of his ideas. In one of my sub-circles of friends, we like to joke that "it's all Greck's fault" for the friend of a friend who introduced a few people to LJ, and those people got a few more hooked, and suddenly, we all had LJ accounts ( ... )

joyce July 26 2006, 02:14:39 UTC

So, I've now finished the book, and I'll have more to say, but for now, I still have to disagree with his assessment of the role of the internet (which he touches on briefly in the Afterward). I think many of us are becoming immune to email, when it comes to things like spam and advertisements and email from people we don't want to deal with, but we still use email to communicate with the maverns and connectors in our lives, and I think he underestimates the role of that. He also didn't go anywhere near the role of online communities and blogs (then again, the book is copyright 2000 and 2002, when such things were really just taking off.)

poets_hand July 26 2006, 02:43:22 UTC

That's true; I really didn't think about the internet. Through this blog I know people from California, Seattle, Washington, South Dakota, Minnesota, Long Island, New York, North Carolina, and England. At least. Probably more that aren't coming to mind. I never would have known them if not for the internet, and they could probably connect me to anyone or anything I need there just by connecting me to the local connector or maven.

Which makes me wonder, how many degrees of separation would there be today?

joyce July 26 2006, 10:54:46 UTC

I was thinking about that last night, actually. It seems like 6 might be a little too high. Even for people who don't use the Internet heavily, like us, Americans are pretty mobile. Even Joe Schmoe who's never left his county is going to have a cousin who joined the military and got stationed somewhere far away, ya know?