Amazon.com review:
"The best way to understand the dramatic transformation of unknown
books into bestsellers, or the rise of teenage smoking, or the
phenomena of word of mouth or any number of the other mysterious
changes that mark everyday life," writes Malcolm Gladwell, "is to think
of them as epidemics. Ideas and products and messages and behaviors
spread just like viruses do." Although anyone familiar with the theory
of memetics will recognize this concept, Gladwell's
The Tipping Point has quite a few interesting twists on the subject.
For example, Paul Revere was able to galvanize the forces of resistance
so effectively in part because he was what Gladwell calls a
"Connector": he knew just about everybody, particularly the
revolutionary leaders in each of the towns that he rode through. But
Revere "wasn't just the man with the biggest Rolodex in colonial
Boston," he was also a "Maven" who gathered extensive information about
the British. He knew what was going on and he knew exactly whom to
tell. The phenomenon continues to this day--think of how often you've
received information in an e-mail message that had been forwarded at
least half a dozen times before reaching you.
Gladwell develops
these and other concepts (such as the "stickiness" of ideas or the
effect of population size on information dispersal) through simple,
clear explanations and entertainingly illustrative anecdotes, such as
comparing the pedagogical methods of
Sesame Street and
Blue's Clues,
or explaining why it would be even easier to play Six Degrees of Kevin
Bacon with the actor Rod Steiger. Although some readers may find the
transitional passages between chapters hold their hands a little too
tightly, and Gladwell's closing invocation of the possibilities of
social engineering sketchy, even chilling,
The Tipping Point is
one of the most effective books on science for a general audience in
ages. It seems inevitable that "tipping point," like "future shock" or
"chaos theory," will soon become one of those ideas that everybody
knows--or at least knows by name.
--Ron Hogan
