9/11 as an example is interesting, I remember talking with
friends the months before it happened about feeling like there was
a kind of global pressure of ineffective rage building against
western corporate/government meddling in other countries, which was
likely to explode in some significant way somewhere soon. Not that
we could have predicted where or who or what. But it made me wonder
later whether there were possibly a million little unconscious
hints in the wind and on the news, like clouds of fractal
butterflies rising to eventually cause the storm in New York. Which
is of course easy to say after the fact, but I don't tend to
believe in "vibes", etc overall.
Black Swan has interesting advise: do things were you are likely
to fail, but where potential upside is huge. But gotcha is to do
several of those attempts with minimal costs. Goes against
traditional wisdom.
Thank you @jyri looking
forward to study this. Btw. any good advices from a experienced
sociologist? What do you see as the most central/important of that
science?
@jyri, I haven't read Shirky
lately, but yes, social software lives and breaths from users and
connections between them, and thus it resembles other areas of life
(literature, music, soft drinks) where the winner takes most and
qualitative differences are less of importance. I.e. social
software is essentially popularity contest. Likelihood of success
is small, but positive black swan effect can be huge.
9 comments so far
That's an excellent book, although reading it for fun (doesn't really relate to anything I do for a "living") makes me feel a bit perverse...
2 months, 2 weeks ago by tolonen.
I know you are sociologist. Where can i read some of your work? Hopefully starting my studies this fall. So exciting!
2 months, 2 weeks ago by Bendix.
9/11 as an example is interesting, I remember talking with friends the months before it happened about feeling like there was a kind of global pressure of ineffective rage building against western corporate/government meddling in other countries, which was likely to explode in some significant way somewhere soon. Not that we could have predicted where or who or what. But it made me wonder later whether there were possibly a million little unconscious hints in the wind and on the news, like clouds of fractal butterflies rising to eventually cause the storm in New York. Which is of course easy to say after the fact, but I don't tend to believe in "vibes", etc overall.
2 months, 2 weeks ago by spongefile.
Black Swan has interesting advise: do things were you are likely to fail, but where potential upside is huge. But gotcha is to do several of those attempts with minimal costs. Goes against traditional wisdom.
2 months, 2 weeks ago by teemu.
@teemu I see connections to Clay Shirky's recent ideas for social software
2 months, 2 weeks ago by jyri.
@Bendix well, if you're interested in social capital, here's a paper on that. There are some more writings at http://aula.org/people/jyri/papers
2 months, 2 weeks ago by jyri.
Thank you @jyri looking forward to study this. Btw. any good advices from a experienced sociologist? What do you see as the most central/important of that science?
2 months, 2 weeks ago by Bendix.
@jyri, I haven't read Shirky lately, but yes, social software lives and breaths from users and connections between them, and thus it resembles other areas of life (literature, music, soft drinks) where the winner takes most and qualitative differences are less of importance. I.e. social software is essentially popularity contest. Likelihood of success is small, but positive black swan effect can be huge.
2 months, 2 weeks ago by teemu.
Is anyone else reading "Here comes everybody"?
2 months, 2 weeks ago by adewale.