Missing the Point?

Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering by Malcolm Gladwell

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


The original The Tipping Point was considered a seminal work. As a professional marketer I remember devouring its thesis, as I tried to make sense of consumer behaviour.

The best part of three decades and a pandemic later, what could be the new interpretation? In December I heard the author interviewed and added it to my Christmas wish-list, a small library I am now diligently working through.

But … hmm. I soon found myself straining to follow a tale that rambled through bank robberies in LA, resistance to vaccination in Waldorf schools, and Medicare fraud in Florida.

Seventy-plus pages in, and in the absence of an emerging unifying theory, I began to form my own opinion: that here were clusters of variables desperately seeking an equation.

Now, I might be entirely wrong. But there was the towering presence of unread books beside my bed. A tipping point was reached: one night the TBR pile, next morning the DNF shelf.



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Published on February 19, 2025 13:41
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