Malcolm Gladwell

Normal healthy body function is getting pregnant many times throughout your life. Just because periods are what happens every month to a female body in current society doesn't mean it's normal or healthy. There's reason to think that modern women having so many periods throughout their adult lives is at least partly to blame for higher incidences of various female-specific cancers (breast in particular, but also uterine and ovarian). Reducing the number of periods a woman has in her lifetime greatly reduces the risk of those cancers. http://gladwell.com/john-rock-s-error/

Should they have smaller quota for smaller boards? If the change of selecting woman or man would be totally equal, 11-18% of company boards with 5-8 members would fail this criteria. Where is the line between discrimination and unconscious prejudice and should we treat them differently? For example, it seems that height is as important as race or gender as a determinant of wages and leadership roles. http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/everyday_economics/2002/03/short_ch… http://gladwell.com/blink/why-do-we-love-tall-men/ >In the U.S. population, about 14.5 percent of all men are six feet or over. Among CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, that number is 58 percent.

> "%90 of options expire worthless, the real money is in selling them!" -- Abraham Lincoln It's risk-reward thing, akin to 90% of disaster insurance policyholders won't make claims, but when the hurricane happens, you're gonna be screwed because the premium of the insurance is not calculated by an actuary but by the market where if you're an overzealous option seller, will have underpriced such that you may not have enough capital to cover the cost. If you want to read more about option selling, I highly recommend Malcom Gladwell's New Yorker piece http://gladwell.com/blowing-up/ or you can also learn the way I did, by trading and being humbled by the market. P.S. Options came into fashion in the 60's, so I don't think Lincoln ever got into financial engineering with financing the Civil War...

Sounds plausible to me... like Buffet says, it's about temperament. Marginally related: nice old article about Taleb vs Neiderhoffer: http://www.gladwell.com/2002/2002_04_29_a_blowingup.htm Both brilliant guys, IQs off the charts, but the difference is clearly temperament. Neiderhoffer was the genius and squash champ at Harvard. The typical M.D. probably has life experience closer to his. In contrast, Taleb writes a lot about his family suffering through the Lebanese civil war. I know who I would trust with my money :)

It could be argued that the "hire the best people and give them the tools and information to do their jobs" strategy hasn't worked out that well for product management at Google. Google Docs and App Engine are two prime examples of dysfunctional product management that seems to value the opinions of "the best people" (supposedly Google employees) more than those of the customers. Malcolm Gladwell's article "The Talent Myth" seems fitting: http://www.gladwell.com/2002/2002_07_22_a_talent.htm

>It's quite interesting to hear how the genius idea of a bar code was conceived by dragging four fingers in the sand. In 1920, fourteen-year-old Philo Farnsworth was tilling his family's Idaho potato field. He'd been thinking of how to transmit motion pictures electronically. Observing the neat parallel lines of the potato field, it occurred to him that a frame to be transmitted could be broken down into parallel lines, transmitted, and reproduced at the remote end, line by line, in synchrony. http://www.gladwell.com/2002/2002_05_27_a_televisionary.htm

Seeing some of my favorite hole in the wall restaurants get bad reviews and seeing some bland and uninteresting (but good) places get great reviews on Yelp has made me remember Malcolm Gladwell's commentary on people's preferences for three distinct flavors of spaghetti sauce. "If you sifted carefully through the data, though, you could find patterns, and Moskowitz learned that most people's preferences fell into one of three broad groups: plain, spicy, and extra-chunky"[1] Which tells me that since Yelp tries to aggregate everyone's taste into one unified rating metric, the tastes from which Yelp ratings are derived are quite likely to be different from those of my own. Thus I really can't trust Yelp ratings, even if there were no 'gaming' or 'extortion' going on in their reviews. [1] http://www.gladwell.com/2004/2004_09_06_a_ketchup.html

> Gladwell might be a compelling - albeit extremely formulaic - writer, but how does he fare as a journalist? In fairness, we probably shouldn't judge him as a journalist. He's a storyteller and a popularizer instead: someone who reads scholarly works and whips them into a shape that larger audiences can and will read. Case in point: in 1985, Timothy Wilson published an amazing article called "Strangers to Ourselves". Years later, he turned it into a book (of the same title). But most people haven't heard of Wilson or that book, certainly nowhere near as many people as have heard of or read Malcolm Gladwell's Blink. By Gladwell's own admission, most of the ideas in Blink start from Wilson's work.[1] [1] http://www.gladwell.com/tippingpoint/tp_reading.html

In 2008, Gladwell wrote an excellent article on this same topic: http://www.gladwell.com/2008/2008_10_20_a_latebloomers.html An excellent quote from the article: "The Cézannes of the world bloom late not as a result of some defect in character, or distraction, or lack of ambition, but because the kind of creativity that proceeds through trial and error necessarily takes a long time to come to fruition."

Nexium is a patent extension of Prilosec. In order to patent Nexium, they had to alter the chemical structure and run clinical trials to show that Nexium was an improvement over Prilosec. Some critics argued that the trials inflated the differences. IIRC, when some generic drug makers tried to sell generic versions of Nexium, AstraZeneca sued them and won. Malcolm Gladwell, covered this and other issues affecting pharmaceutical pricing in a 2004 article. It's an even-handed article, worth reading the entire piece - http://www.gladwell.com/2004/2004_10_25_a_drugs.html

Ian Rowland's book is great stuff. I also recall a Malcolm Gladwell article that travelled some of the same territory and used Rowland as a source: http://www.gladwell.com/2007/2007_11_12_a_profile.html Of course, that dealt with the possible inefficacy of FBI psychological profilers, which is less comfortable to think about than gullible office-workers.

Start with Jane Jacobs (google her, quite famous), then read her "The Death and Life of Great American Cities". It's helps you understand why cities work, why they don't, what makes a neighbourhood, what destroys them and how almost everything city planners and governments think matters, actually doesn't. After that, read the Malcolm Gladwell article how her findings can be applied to office culture. http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_12_11_a_working.html After all that, apply all that to offices you've seen.

The following Malcolm Gladwell article from 1997 is exactly on this topic: http://www.gladwell.com/1997/1997_05_19_a_sports.htm Not everyone loves Gladwell's writing, but I found the article interesting and thought-provoking.

There are a lot more factors to look into other than the level of proficiency in programming: I would hire a so-so programmer who have room to grow in addition to being able to follow directions and schedule over any super star. Related article : Are smart people overrated? - Malcolm Gladwell http://www.gladwell.com/2002/2002_07_22_a_talent.htm

"The best way to make a defining-moment decision is to study all the facts, learn everything you can about the circumstances you're in, the pros and cons, the cost-benefit analysis, and then make your decision. It's really got to be thought out." cf. http://www.gladwell.com/2010/2010_01_18_a_surething.html

Don't bother. Instead, go to his New Yorker archive. http://www.gladwell.com/archive.html Gladwell is best taken in small (or at least syncopated) doses, and he really has managed to write about a variety of interesting things. Go find the ketchup essay. It's awesome.

For another great article on Judith Harris, see Malcolm Gladwell's 1998 piece in the New Yorker: http://gladwell.com/1998/1998_08_17_a_harris.htm

Highly recommend Nassim Nicholas Taleb's Fooled by Randomness and The Black Swan. also http://www.gladwell.com/2002/2002_04_29_a_blowingup.htm

All that buildup for some Tony Robbins flapdoodle? Here's a classic article touching on similar topics: "Before he was two years old, it is said, Wayne Gretzky watched hockey games on television, enraptured, and slid his stockinged feet on the linoleum in imitation of the players, then cried when the game was over, because he could not understand how something so sublime should have to come to an end. This was long before Gretzky was any good at the game itself, or was skilled in any of its aspects[...] But what he had was what the physical genius must have before any of the other layers of expertise fall into place: he had stumbled onto the one thing that, on some profound aesthetic level, made him happy." -- From The Physical Genius, by Malcolm Gladwell: http://www.gladwell.com/1999/1999_08_02_a_genius.htm

This is such a hard problem to solve and there will only be less and less money for it. It is a good approach to start helping people to help themselves, rather than saying "we'll help you AFTER you fix your hardest problems yourself.". This makes no sense and doesn't work. As shown here and in other cities (http://gladwell.com/million-dollar-murray/), leaving homeless until they get so bad that they need ambulance and ER services is VERY expensive. In our local town, the major hospital group did an experiment. They took a look at the top 50 patients that used the most of their ER and other services. They hired people whose job it was to make sure they stayed on track, got them to appointments (rides and public transport are big issues), made sure they stayed on their meds and followed treatment plans. It was a great success. They used ~70% of the resources that they used before. BUT, the hospital made lots of money on the use of those services, the experiment cost the hospital almost $1M!! It was not continued as hospitals exist to make money not help people. So let's say a city takes a stance to be progressive and helps their homeless and (largely) gets them back on their feet. Pretty soon everyone in the surrounding areas hear about all the help and services and now one small town is dealing with all homeless that can get to this town. Smaller towns only have so much money to invest in an effort such as this. Additionally, what all jobs can you find to give all these…

Malcolm Gladwell's excellent 2006 New Yorker article "Million Dollar Murray" directly addresses some of the grumbling in the comments below... it's easy for people who've followed the law to resent spending money on people who've broken the law, but it would be more efficient to spend a little money on decreasing recidivism and save a lot on incarceration. Gladwell sums it up nicely with an example from Denver's homelessness problems: "That is what is so perplexing about power-law homeless policy. From an economic perspective the approach makes perfect sense. But from a moral perspective it doesn’t seem fair. Thousands of people in the Denver area no doubt live day to day, work two or three jobs, and are eminently deserving of a helping hand—and no one offers them the key to a new apartment. Yet that’s just what the guy screaming obscenities and swigging Dr. Tich gets. When the welfare mom’s time on public assistance runs out, we cut her off. Yet when the homeless man trashes his apartment we give him another. Social benefits are supposed to have some kind of moral justification. We give them to widows and disabled veterans and poor mothers with small children. Giving the homeless guy passed out on the sidewalk an apartment has a different rationale. It’s simply about efficiency." http://gladwell.com/million-dollar-murray/ EDIT: Changed "much of the grumbling" to "some"

Well, I had almost drowned once. I had a personal flotation device and I knew swimming! We were out rafting, and I had swayed away from the raft swimming in light rapids (the instructor said its very safe - which it wasn't). When I realized that the rapids were overwhelming me, I tried to stay afloat (a flotation device and know-how of floating works - but I guess I was panicked!), but did not help too much. It took me sometime to realize I was drowning, and in the meantime I had told another raft that had approached to help - that I was fine (overconfidence?). When the reality hit, it was bad, and I could not even scream. I did wave my hands, on to which my friends on the raft threw a rope, and I survived. Even swimmers (I consider myself below average) can drown. "Panic" is to blame here. The following article explains a similar case quite here (search for "scuba-diving"): http://www.gladwell.com/2000/2000_08_21_a_choking.html

This reminds me of that article by Malcolm Gladwell about Cézanne and Picasso. Picasso is depicted as the visionary who revolutionizes artistic expression in his teens and Cézanne is a painter who struggles his entire life and doesn't achieve a breakthrough until he is much older. It might provide context to a discussion like this: http://www.gladwell.com/2008/2008_10_20_a_latebloomers.html Yet, I wonder if achievement is evenly distributed across the range of all ages, and what is not evenly distributed are mentions of the achiever's age when mentioning her or his achievement. If artist A revolutionizes the art world at the age of 23 and artist B does so at the age of 60, would it not be more likely to see when the respective artists achievements are mentioned? i.e.: Artist A revolutionized the art world and he did so at the age of 23 Artist B revolutionized the art world. Anyway, the statement "I'm 30 and haven't done anything, so I won't" is based on a number normative assumptions. Not everyone is 30 finds herself in the same set of circumstances. Further, normativity is antithetical to creation, so a sentiment behind this post is contradictory. Ultimately, the answer is to have ideas that are easy to follow through but are not obvious. That's how you look like a prodigy, i think.

I was reading a book called "Super Crunchers" (a book on industrial use of data-mining), and it mentioned a company called "Epagogix" which predicts movie profits (also covered less tersely by Malcome Gladwell - http://www.gladwell.com/2006/2006_10_16_a_formula.html). In Super Crunchers, it describes a meeting between Epagogix, some potential investors, and some Hollywood heavyweights. The investors quizzed the movie guys on why they didn't want to buy in - the movie guys said that even if Epagogix could get 100% accurate, they wouldn't use it. If they used it, they would lose some of their own influence, and so they wouldn't get invited to the right parties. The investors loved that response, because it meant that the market was ripe for disruption. Epagogix wasn't so happy, though. When broadcasters control a channel, they don't just get to tax it. They get personal perks as well. You might think that the purpose of toll boothes is to pay for roads. People who work in toll boothes might think it's the other way round. TV channels are the same - you might think execs are there to ensure only good shows get access to limited screen-time, but they think that limited screen-time exists to keep them in a job.

Gladwell wrote a piece last year that suggested the most successful entrepreneurs come out ahead by finding clever ways to avoid risk. Forgive the long excerpt, but it really is good. "In a recent study, "From Predators to Icons," the French scholars Michel Villette and Catherine Vuillermot set out to discover what successful entrepreneurs have in common. They present case histories of businessmen who built their own empires—ranging from Sam Walton, of Wal-Mart, to Bernard Arnault, of the luxury-goods conglomerate L.V.M.H.—and chart what they consider the typical course of a successful entrepreneur's career. There is almost always, they conclude, a moment of great capital accumulation—a particular transaction that catapults him into prominence. The entrepreneur has access to that deal by virtue of occupying a "structural hole," a niche that gives him a unique perspective on a particular market. Villette and Vuillermot go on, "The businessman looks for partners to a transaction who do not have the same definition as he of the value of the goods exchanged, that is, who undervalue what they sell to him or overvalue what they buy from him in comparison to his own evaluation." He moves decisively. He repeats the good deal over and over again, until the opportunity closes, and—most crucially—his focus throughout that sequence is on hedging his bets and minimizing his chances of failure. The truly successful businessman, in Villette and Vuillermot's telling, is anything but a…

Will you please clarify your response? It seems like you're conflating 2 different things. The two things that I see here are: 1) How do we determine who is a good teacher versus a bad teacher? 2) Should we fire "bad" teachers, or should we just fire teachers who underperform to some standard? #1 is a very difficult question. Malcolm Gladwell has a great essay on how teachers are like NFL quarterbacks: we can't really tell ahead of time who will succeed. (http://www.gladwell.com/2008/2008_12_15_a_teacher.html) #2, are you against firing teachers who are "bad", assuming we had some decent way to separate the bad from the good (not just based on test scores, or even the improvement in scores)? Because the teachers union (at least here in California), is adamantly against even firing the bad teachers. Granted, it's a moot point until we can come up with a good teacher evaluation heuristic (and I personally do not believe it will put much weight on test scores...) Also, WRT to evaluating teachers through students' test scores: have you ever seen The Wire? One of the main characters (Bunny Colvin) moves from being a cop to an educator. At the end of the year, he is forced to "teach to the test" (e.g., only cover test material) rather than helping his students learn (which he was doing before). I believe this to be an accurate criticism of why we shouldn't use student test scores to eval teachers: it screws up the incentives, and makes the goal for students to beat a…

"The best thing I can do for many of my patients is to make absolutely sure they have bipolar disorder (and have a need for one of these medications). The recent rate of growth of the diagnosis is concerning for over-diagnosis." Indeed. It is surprisingly hard for medical system to reverse a diagnosis, so what's made first often sticks. (I know this from my own experience, my friend's, and Rosenhan's experiment). And too often bipolar is confused with borderline, or ptsd, or simply depression... this is particularly bad because some of the drugs which work for some of the illnesses instead drastically increase suicidality in others. http://www.gladwell.com/2003/2003_03_10_a_dots.html "In the early nineteen-seventies, a professor of psychology at Stanford University named David L. Rosenhan gathered together a painter, a graduate student, a pediatrician, a psychiatrist, a housewife, and three psychologists. He told them to check into different psychiatric hospitals under aliases, with the complaint that they had been hearing voices. They were instructed to say that the voices were unfamiliar, and that they heard words like "empty,""thud," and "hollow." Apart from that initial story, the pseudo patients were instructed to answer every question truthfully, to behave as they normally would, and to tell the hospital staff--at every opportunity--that the voices were gone and that they had experienced no further symptoms. The eight subjects were hospitalized, on average, for…

> Have you ever seen the Dog Whisperer? Cesar Milan's body language communicates to dogs and humans that he is the leader. "When Cesar walked down the stairs of Patrice and Scott's home then, and crouched down in the back yard, JonBee looked at him, intently. And what he saw was someone who moved in a very particular way. Cesar is fluid. "He's beautifully organized intra-physically," Karen Bradley, who heads the graduate dance program at the University of Maryland, said when she first saw tapes of Cesar in action. "That lower-unit organization—I wonder whether he was a soccer player." Movement experts like Bradley use something called Laban Movement Analysis to make sense of movement, describing, for instance, how people shift their weight, or how fluid and symmetrical they are when they move, or what kind of "effort" it involves. Is it direct or indirect—that is, what kind of attention does the movement convey? Is it quick or slow? Is it strong or light—that is, what is its intention? Is it bound or free—that is, how much precision is involved? If you want to emphasize a point, you might bring your hand down across your body in a single, smooth motion. But how you make that motion greatly affects how your point will be interpreted by your audience. Ideally, your hand would come down in an explosive, bound movement—that is, with accelerating force, ending abruptly and precisely—and your head and shoulders would descend simultaneously, so posture and gesture would be in…

Your post reminded of Gladwell's piece on "Physical Genius" http://www.gladwell.com/1999/1999_08_02_a_genius.htm From the article: What sets physical geniuses apart from other people, then, is not merely being able to do something but knowing what to do--their capacity to pick up on subtle patterns that others generally miss. This is what we mean when we say that great athletes have a "feel" for the game, or that they "see" the court or the field or the ice in a special way. Wayne Gretzky, in a 1981 game against the St. Louis Blues, stood behind the St. Louis goal, laid the puck across the blade of his stick, then bounced it off the back of the goalie in front of him and into the net. Gretzky's genius at that moment lay in seeing a scoring possibility where no one had seen one before. "People talk about skating, puck-handling, and shooting," Gretzky told an interviewer some years later, "but the whole sport is angles and caroms, forgetting the straight direction the puck is going, calculating where it will be diverted, factoring in all the interruptions."

good reading right up to the last point ... '... we need better predictive tools to plot the speed at which new technologies will spread. Spreadsheet gymnastics by 20-something b-school graduates should not dictate our investment decisions. We can produce better predictions. We have the data - from decades of technology innovation. We have the ability to analyze the data - after all, Everett Rogers wrote "Diffusion of Innovations" 40 years ago ...' [0] Baloney. When will these analysts get it into their heads you cannot predict with certainty by looking into the past figures. If this was the case there would be a lot more people making a killing on the markets, insurance companies would be rolling in dollars because they could reliably predict disasters et., al. As for the solution or alternative I just don't know. Maybe closely observing select influences in a Gladwellian sort of way [1]. Maybe something the way O`Reilly keeps an eye on the Alpha Geeks to guide what trends are worth investigating. [2] Reference [0] business plan archive, 'Top Ten Lessons from the Dot Com Meltdown, 10) Prediction tools must improve', Ibid. [1] Malcom Gladwell describes one such way you can make rapid decisions by gathering less information on a subject and focusing on a few key indicators. ~ http://www.gladwell.com/blink [2] Tim O`Reilly may well have read Gladwells book because seems to (publicly anyway) pay close attention to "the alpha geeks" in the hope of understanding gaps,…