Is the Tipping Point Real?
There has been a meme circulating the blogosphere about a Fast Company article in which Duncan Watts, a Columbia professor, attempts to debunk the Tipping Point theory. Watts set up simulations to test who the initiators of viral epidemics are. He found that influencers are not necessarily the starting point of viral epidemics. Instead the initiator of an epidemic was left up to chance.
Watts states that Tipping Point supporters “start with an existing trend, like Hush Puppies, and they go backward until they’ve identified the people who did it first, and then they go, ‘Okay, these are the Influentials!” Malcom Gladwell suggests that “articles by academics can ever do is uncover a little piece of the bigger picture.”
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