So what I like about Gladwell's books?
1. They deal with lots of research and fact-based experiments
2. Extended use of academic work in sociology and psychology
3. Interesting concepts on marketing and advertising
And what makes this book worth reading?
Let's say you have an 'idea', you know it is a sensational one and it will be well-received by the people but what does it take for it to spread like a wildfire? well, Malcolm has the answer.
Malcolm talks about the 'stickiness' factor in the message you broadcast, the participation of "connectors, sales people, mavens" (basically people with rich connections) who help 'tipping' an idea or a trend. There are stories about how the 'Hush puppies' (an american brand) saw a sudden tipping in their sales in 1995, Baltimore's Syphilis problem and how New York city crime rates came down drastically during 90's.
Although the whole book is a page-turner with interesting findings in every page,the part that I liked most was a study about suicides and cigarette smoking which Malcolm uses to propose two solutions to stop young people from smoking.
According to Malcolm, "The world-much as we want it to-doesn't accord with our intuition. We must listen to the environment and look for evidences to test our intuition. Many often it contradicts with our assumptions we hold about ourselves and each other".
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