the most consequential forms of bias are not in people’s heads, but rather in their social networks.

We discovered that these seemingly irrelevant features of social media—specifically, graphics that remind people about their party loyalties—have a powerful influence on how social networks operate. Wide

The key feature of an egalitarian network is that new ideas and opinions can emerge from anywhere in the community and spread to everyone without being blocked by a powerful social star at the center of the network.

Coordination: Some innovations are appealing only if people use them together.

The more that people’s awareness of a product outpaces its actual uptake, the stronger the implicit signal from all of those non-adopters that there’s something wrong with it.

Complex contagions are contagions that people resist.

Rapid economic growth and increased social mobility expanded the audience for Broadway shows. At the same time, the loss of many of Broadway’s talented artists during the Second World War created a vacuum, bringing an influx of new blood into the New York City creative scene.

clustering preserves diversity. Not demographic diversity. But informational diversity.

The basic formula for creating a musical is well known. You need a composer to write the music, a lyricist to write the lyrics, a librettist to write the plot of the story, a choreographer to plan the dancing, a director to communicate the team’s vision to the actors, and, finally, a producer to pay the bills.