I recently finished reading The Tipping Point, where the author discusses how epidemics can start (be tipped) by tiny things, such as who is delivering the message. He gives an example of this in Paul Revere’s ride, and how people listened to him because Paul was a likeable, social guy who seemed to have a smart head on his shoulders.
While that all made sense to me, I hadn’t really seen an example of it really “in my face” until I saw this post on TheFeature.
The author clearly states that he would check out Spoke solely because Mark Granovetter (on our Technical Advisory Board) was the one who invited him. I’m sure that if I had invited this guy, I wouldn’t have had nearly the same impact.
Anyway, I just thought it was interesting to see someone actually spell out one of the core concepts presented in The Tipping Point. Usually it’s not so obvious 
on Dec 2nd, 2003 at 12:02 am
You are right.. you wouldn’t have had that effect on that person, but it’s not simply because Granovetter is a maven. In fact, i would argue that it’s Granovetter’s reputation that convinced this person, not his likeability. Granovetter probably would have less impact on your mom than you would. It’s important to tease out the difference between maven behavior and reputation when conceptualizing these things.