The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell is a book I picked up when I saw the trailer from Fortune magazine "A fascinating book that makes you see the world in a different way."
Started: 1/9/2017
Completed: 1/10/2017
Recommendation: Not a strong recommendation
Recommended By: Nobody
Review:
I was anticipating something like Freakonomics (see my post http://reademall.blogspot.com/2014/09/super-freakonomics-levitt-and-dubner.html), but got something much more subtle and dated. It looks like this book which was written in 2000 was far more subject to more current research than one might thing. The "law of 7" and the "rule of 150" are both rather well established and it is mildly interesting to see how they play a role in the idea of something suddenly becoming popular or being wildly successful. The references to the broken window theory and its association with crime have been pretty solidly disproven.
In addition, the whole concept of Paul Revere's ride upon which several examples in the book hinge have also been disproven. Gladwell suggests that Revere was more successful than Dawes, but this assertion is only in the Longfellow poem. Moreover, there was likely a third rider involved as well. Beyond that, there were a slew of messages to get everyone ready for the British...so many, in fact, that Revere's contributions were likely just a drop in the bucket (still heroic and immortalized by Longfellow). This seriously dilutes the example.
These are just the examples for which I know the back story.
Having said that, the concepts presented in the book are interesting and worth the read, it's just that the examples are not compelling.
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