The Long Tail

I just finished The Long Tail by Chris Anderson (Amazon) and heartily recommend it to anyone with even the slightest interest in economics, the web, marketing or... well anything really.

The core concept is that at the top of the chart (be it music, book sales, or search results) you have a small number of bestsellers, the big hits that everyone buys/sees/reads/whatevers. But as you move down the chart, things still sell if given the chance. If you do not have to be concerned about limited shelf space and can give your customers ways to easily find the unusual, niche items they want, you can really cash in.

Chris Anderson is the editor of Wired Magazine and has been investigating this phenomena for a few years, gathering examples, data and quotes from a variety of sources. He's got a very friendly, easy to read style and an interesting perspective on the subject, as both a professional editor and generic user.

Some books based on a relatively simple concept can focus too much on explaining the idea over and over again, leaving you with a 3 page article that's extended into 200 pages of babble. This book avoids that very well, applying the concept to historical events, unexpected fields and looking at possibilities of where it might lead in the future.

A fascinating concept beautifully told, read it as soon as possible before the examples go out of date.