New Yorker business columnist James Surowiecki offers an appealingly simple if somewhat counterintuitive thesis: that large groups of people are smarter than an elite few, no matter how brilliant--better at solving problems, fostering innovation, coming to wise decisions, even predicting the future. Surowiecki ranges across fields as diverse as popular culture, psychology, ant biology, economic behaviorism, artificial intelligence, military history and political theory to show just how this principle operates in the real world. [Doubleday]
Critic Reviews
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Favorable
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Kirkus Reviews
There is some individual, independent wisdom to be found here.
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Favorable
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Library Journal Lucy Heckman
This work is an intriguing study of collective intelligence and how it works in contemporary society. [1 Apr 2004, p.105]
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Favorable
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London Review Of Books David Runciman
The first half of this book, in which Surowiecki itemises the dangers of supposing that it is always best to listen to the smartest person in the room, is electrifying... But the second half of the book, in which Surowiecki applies these lessons to a series of case studies, is a bit of a disappointment.
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Favorable
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Publishers Weekly
Surowiecki's style is pleasantly informal, a tactical disguise for what might otherwise be rather dense material.
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Favorable
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The Globe And Mail [Toronto] Nigel Waters
There is much that anyone working for any sort of organization can learn from this book.
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Favorable
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The Guardian Richard Adams
[An] intelligent book.
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Favorable
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The New York Times Book Review Scott McLemee
The author has a knack for translating the most algebraic of research papers into bright expository prose -- though the swarm of anecdotes at times makes it difficult to follow the progress of his argument.
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Favorable
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The Onion A.V. Club Donna Bowman
Each chapter assembles a concise, up-to-date treatise on the essential problems facing decision-makers and collaborators.
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Favorable
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Washington Post Eric Klinenberg
Both intellectually challenging and a pleasure to read. And yet Surowiecki's case for the crowd is ultimately unpersuasive.
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Favorable
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Christian Science Monitor John Freeman
Not just revolutionary but essential reading for everyone.
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Mixed
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The New Republic Cass R. Sunstein
The performance of groups is a wonderful subject, and Surowiecki has a remarkable eye for the telling anecdote, illustrating abstract claims with vivid examples. His central point is convincing.... But there is a serious problem with Surowiecki's discussion: he does not provide an adequate account of the circumstances that make crowds wise or stupid.
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Mixed
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San Francisco Chronicle Jeremy Adam Smith
But while "The Wisdom of Crowds" is on firm ground when describing group processes with quantifiable outcomes, it is weak when treading into the moral and political dimensions of its topic, as well as the quality of outcomes.
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Mixed
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Daily Telegraph Edward Skidelsky
It betrays its origin as a series of New Yorker columns, leaping from fact to fact and never sustaining a coherent argument for more than 20 pages.
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Unfavorable
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The Spectator Mark Archer
The weakness of Surowiecki's rambling book (it would have worked better as a short essay in the New Yorker) is that he tries to turn a statistical truism into a sociological phenomenon.
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