From: Jerry Bryson (jbryson@infionline.net)
Date: Thu 16 Feb 2006 - 22:56:25 GMT
On Feb 16, 2006, at 1:29 PM, William Benzon wrote:
> Matthew J. Salganik,1,2* Peter Sheridan Dodds,2* Duncan J. Watts1,2,3*
>
> Hit songs, books, and movies are many times more successful than
> average,
> suggesting that "the best" alternatives are qualitatively different
> from
> "the rest"; yet experts routinely fail to predict which products will
> succeed. We investigated this paradox experimentally, by creating an
> artificial "music market" in which 14,341 participants downloaded
> previously
> unknown songs either with or without knowledge of previous
> participants'
> choices. Increasing the strength of social influence increased both
> inequality and unpredictability of success.
This sounds like a job for chaos theory.
>
On another note:
> Success was also only partly
> determined by quality: The best songs rarely did poorly, and the worst
> rarely did well, but any other result was possible.
How did they evaluate which songs were "best" and "worst?
'Mother, may I go and maffick,
Tear around and hinder traffic?
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