Monthly Archives: April 2009

Here’s an example of experts that just don’t get it. Authors of a newly-publicized (thanks to the equally-clueless NYTimes) study are claiming new insight into the mechanics of buzz via statistical mapping.

The aim of the study, called “The Geography of Buzz,” was “to be able to quantify and understand, visually and spatially, how this creative cultural scene really worked.”

To find out, the authors mined thousands of photographs from Getty Images that chronicled flashy parties and smaller affairs on both coasts for a year, beginning in March 2006. It was not a culturally comprehensive data set, the researchers admit, but a wide-ranging one. And because the photos were for sale, they had to be of events that people found inherently interesting, “a good proxy for ‘buzz-worthy’ social contexts.”

Commercial photography is certainly an indicator of American Idol mass-media culture. But should we really be…