Today, two articles really stuck out at me and I felt they should be mentioned here.

First, Onalytica had a great article on Predicting Sales from Online Buzz where they pose the question “What if you could listen to the online debate and precisely predict how much you (or your competitors) are going to sell next month or quarter?”

Second, Fast Company wrote an article challenging the conventional wisdom surrounding the relative ability of influential people to ignite social trends. Titled, “Is the Tipping Point Toast?” the article explores the research of Duncan Watts a prominent academic and current researcher with Yahoo!. The article states, “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.” Take that Malcolm Gladwell.