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Here's my takeaway from this piece: "Why didn't the Influentials wield more power? With 40 times the reach of a normal person, why couldn't they kick-start a t

Here's my takeaway from this piece: "Why didn't the Influentials wield more power? With 40 times the reach of a normal person, why couldn't they kick-start a trend every time? Watts believes this is because a trend's success depends not on the person who starts it, but on how susceptible the society is overall to the trend--not how persuasive the early adopter is, but whether everyone else is easily persuaded. And in fact, when Watts tweaked his model to increase everyone's odds of being infected, the number of trends skyrocketed." This sure seems to back up Adreessen's argument that market opportunity is the single most important factor in considering an opportunity.

waterlesscloud 17y ago
This whole article rests on the idea that reach (number of followers) equals influence. Twitter pretty much proves that wrong right out of the gate, so why is anyone debating it? This says absolutely nothing about whether people with real influence (which isn't the same thing at all as number of connections) affect things.
- Tichy 17y ago
  Does Twitter disprove that? A lot of people with many followers on Twitter have mostly fake followers. I think people with a lot of real followers do have influence on Twitter. For example a friend of mine bought a band's new album just because @veronica mentioned that she liked them. @veronica has 1500000 followers on Twitter. I think for a band it can make a real difference if she mentions them.
GavinB 17y ago
So then the trendsetters still get to set trends. They are the people who recognize what will be persuasive, and adopt or create it. They are also the people who try new things and are out "persuading." Trendsetters are necessary but not sufficient condition for creating a trend. The lesson for marketers is that you need to create a product that fits the times and push it to the right people.

waterlesscloud 17y ago

This whole article rests on the idea that reach (number of followers) equals influence. Twitter pretty much proves that wrong right out of the gate, so why is anyone debating it? This says absolutely nothing about whether people with real influence (which isn't the same thing at all as number of connections) affect things.

Tichy 17y ago
Does Twitter disprove that? A lot of people with many followers on Twitter have mostly fake followers. I think people with a lot of real followers do have influence on Twitter. For example a friend of mine bought a band's new album just because @veronica mentioned that she liked them. @veronica has 1500000 followers on Twitter. I think for a band it can make a real difference if she mentions them.

GavinB 17y ago

So then the trendsetters still get to set trends. They are the people who recognize what will be persuasive, and adopt or create it. They are also the people who try new things and are out "persuading." Trendsetters are necessary but not sufficient condition for creating a trend. The lesson for marketers is that you need to create a product that fits the times and push it to the right people.