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I think it's more of a winner takes all phenomenon in the Conan case. Usain Bolt makes millions because he's a tenth of a second (or less!) faster than many ot

I think it's more of a winner takes all phenomenon in the Conan case. Usain Bolt makes millions because he's a tenth of a second (or less!) faster than many other people. Those other people - with the exception of maybe Justin Gatlan - make a far more modest salary. It's less than a 1% difference in performance that leads to orders of magnitudes differences in outcomes.

fierro 9y ago
interesting comparison!
mrlala 9y ago
Like the sumo wrestler phenomenon from Freakanomics.. something like the top 10 are extremely well off where after that it's crap salary.
devonkim 9y ago
Exactly, and winner takes all is extremely common for markets competing for rather limited markets. In sports, consumers really don’t pay much attention to high school athletes, car designs are becoming more and more homogeneous, and in pop music there’s increasingly more convergence in terms of style (although the irony is that the entertainment industry is entirely driven forward by trying to “discover” a new trend that appeals). My point is mostly that our collective attention spans are very limited and any business that depends upon attention from mass consumers will be constrained by the simple fact that we all only have 24 hours a day and that we can only support / raise so many children that then also only have so much time. This, it is a mass war for attention with primarily superpowers around (celebrities).
speby 9y ago
But he isn't being paid for being 1% faster .... he is being paid because he is the FASTEST. It doesn't matter if he was 0.5% faster, 10% faster, or any other percentage. It matters that he is the FASTEST. That's the label that draws people's attention, not the 1% incremental faster-ness. =)
baybal2 9y ago
Reminds me my first year as a webdev. I was extremely lucky to ride the apex web 2.0 hype/insanity wave. Now I can't believe myself that I, as a 21 years old and just 3 years of for-profit programming experience, got CAD 85k on first real job Canada for just jquery animations. Later down the career path in Canada, I was frequently asked "you worked for guy A and B, than must've been hell of a job?" or "how I got there to begin with?" All of them dismiss my explanation that "I just used to be on line 1 of google for thing A" The back side of the coin? The moment web 2.0 became a more of an "in-house" production with mid-to-big sized companies that no longer needed a "hired gun" outsider, and hype wave moved to other things I really hit a wall. Actually, on my next 2 jobs I took salary in $70ks and was contemplating selling major life assets after my last employer in Canada was unable to extend my work permit. Things went much better after I scaled down my appetites and stopped looking for employment with companies obsessed with "rockstar hiring"

fierro 9y ago

interesting comparison!

mrlala 9y ago

Like the sumo wrestler phenomenon from Freakanomics.. something like the top 10 are extremely well off where after that it's crap salary.

devonkim 9y ago

Exactly, and winner takes all is extremely common for markets competing for rather limited markets. In sports, consumers really don’t pay much attention to high school athletes, car designs are becoming more and more homogeneous, and in pop music there’s increasingly more convergence in terms of style (although the irony is that the entertainment industry is entirely driven forward by trying to “discover” a new trend that appeals). My point is mostly that our collective attention spans are very limited and any business that depends upon attention from mass consumers will be constrained by the simple fact that we all only have 24 hours a day and that we can only support / raise so many children that then also only have so much time. This, it is a mass war for attention with primarily superpowers around (celebrities).

speby 9y ago

But he isn't being paid for being 1% faster .... he is being paid because he is the FASTEST. It doesn't matter if he was 0.5% faster, 10% faster, or any other percentage. It matters that he is the FASTEST. That's the label that draws people's attention, not the 1% incremental faster-ness. =)

baybal2 9y ago

Reminds me my first year as a webdev. I was extremely lucky to ride the apex web 2.0 hype/insanity wave. Now I can't believe myself that I, as a 21 years old and just 3 years of for-profit programming experience, got CAD 85k on first real job Canada for just jquery animations. Later down the career path in Canada, I was frequently asked "you worked for guy A and B, than must've been hell of a job?" or "how I got there to begin with?" All of them dismiss my explanation that "I just used to be on line 1 of google for thing A" The back side of the coin? The moment web 2.0 became a more of an "in-house" production with mid-to-big sized companies that no longer needed a "hired gun" outsider, and hype wave moved to other things I really hit a wall. Actually, on my next 2 jobs I took salary in $70ks and was contemplating selling major life assets after my last employer in Canada was unable to extend my work permit. Things went much better after I scaled down my appetites and stopped looking for employment with companies obsessed with "rockstar hiring"