The World's Best Book Summaries
What are the keys to creating a great, “sticky” marketing message? How do you get your marketing messages to spread? We’ll look at how to formulate marketing messages that stick and how to spread them to create an epidemic.
Aviation safety has improved dramatically in the last few decades. What elements can we credit for the increased safety of planes? While knowledge and advanced technology have certainly played their part, we might have a simple checklist to thank for improved airplane safety. Learn why.
Who is Lieutenant Jimmy Cross in The Things They Carried? What are the defining moments for his character? First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross is the commanding officer in charge of Alpha Company, a unit of the U.S. Army in the Vietnam War, in The Things They Carried. Cross is a reluctant leader and often feels guilty for the deaths of his men. We’ll cover the most important scenes involving Lieutenant Jimmy Cross in The Things They Carried.
What is the “network effect”? How does it work? What impact does the network effect have on how you spread your fabulous ideas? The network effect is the theory that, in some cases, the number of users of a good or service affects the value of that good or service. According to the network effect, the more users, the higher the value of the service or product. We’ll cover how the network effect works and how we’ve become so overwhelmed by the various networks available to us that we’re starting to become immune to them.
How does Ted Lavender die in The Things They Carried? What is the significance of his death? Ted Lavender is shot in the head and killed outside a small village during the Vietnam War in The Things They Carried. His death comes entirely out of the blue and deeply impacts his commanding officer. We’ll cover how Ted Lavender dies and how his fellow soldiers deal with his death. Learn how Lavender’s death (and the reactions to it) exemplify the themes of the novel.
Who are Malcolm Gladwell’s connectors? How are they crucial to the spread of ideas and important for business? Connectors are people who seem to know everyone. You can find Connectors in every walk of life. Connectors are sociable, gregarious, and are naturally skilled at making — and keeping in contact with — friends and acquaintances. The term comes from Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point. We’ll cover the role of Tipping Point‘s connectors in business and why they’re crucial to the spread of ideas, services, and products.
What does “channel capacity” mean? How much information is the brain able to store? What does this mean about the number of relationships we’re able to maintain? Channel capacity is a term in cognitive psychology that says humans have limited space in our brains for certain kinds of information: by and large, we can only remember six or seven things — whether objects, numbers, categories, or sounds — before we get overwhelmed and start to lose track. Similarly, social channel capacity states that we have a limited emotional capacity. We can only maintain deep relationships with a limited number of
What are the most prominent The Things They Carried themes? What happens in the book to illustrate these themes? The Things They Carried themes are trauma, brutalization, shame, and the power of storytelling. These are the most important themes in this Vietnam War classic. We’ll cover the most important The Things They Carried themes and look at how they played out in the book.
What are “sticky” ideas? How can you make ideas sticky, so they’re adopted by thousands, or even millions, of people? Sticky ideas are ideas that make an impact and stand out from the white noise of all the other ideas we come across in a day. In marketing, the stickier the idea, the more likely it is to sell a product or service. We’ll cover the principles of sticky ideas and look at some powerful “sticky idea” examples.
What was the purpose of the Stanford Prison Experiment? What were its findings? What does it say about our tendency to overestimate the importance of personality traits over social pressures? We’ll cover the purpose and findings of the Stanford Prison Experiment and discuss its implications.