To launch something new, you need "social dandelions"

Summary

In our last edition, we learned the social science that explains why great ideas like new books, apps, or social movements, mostly originate from within small communities. If you haven’t read it yet, and you’re curious what Airbnb, Iowa’s corn farmers, and Fifty Shades of Grey have in common, then you check it out here. Today, we’re going to turn this law into a playbook by answering four key questions: What type of community is best for launching a new idea? How do you find the right community to introduce your idea to? Which members of a community should you talk to first? How can you maximize the odds that a community will embrace your idea? With a little help from an unruly financial subreddit, a Midwestern blogging conference, and a 1950s farm report, all shall be revealed… 1/4 What type of community is best for launching a new idea? In September 2019, a small-time financial trader named Keith Gill posted a screenshot online that would rock the financial world. It was a receipt for his $53,000 stock trade in the dying video game retailer, GameStop (GME). Much like a new fashion trend or social app, Gill’s trade was a big idea that he hoped would catch on. Gill saw that GME was one of the most heavily 'shorted' stocks, meaning many powerful firms were betting on its collapse. He realized that if the company just stabilized a little, and enough new buyers showed up, those 'shorts' would be trapped. As the stock price rose, they would be forced to buy shares to escape their trade, creating a feedback loop where buying would beget more buying, sending the price violently higher. Gill’s trade was a complex contagion, the kind of opportunity that only works if lots of other people decide to believe at the same time. If he had posted his trade in a conventional investing community—say, a cautious value-investing forum or a personal finance subreddit—it likely would have been dismissed as reckless, over-concentrated, or just plain dumb. But Gill chose to post his scree...