Biography

James SUROWIECKI

The ultimate crowd surfer, Surowiecki writes a column in the New Yorker. Previously he wrote a column in New York magazine and was a contributing editor to Fortune. His breakthrough to a mass audience came with The Wisdom of Crowds, best explained by its sprawling sub-title "Why the many are smarter than the few and how collective wisdom shapes business, economies, societies and nations".

With a backward nod in the direction of Charles Mackay's 1841 book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, Surowiecki argues that groups reach the right decisions time and time again. This relies on diversity of opinion, independence, decentralization and aggregation. Mobs and lemming-like investors tend, in contrast, to be characterized by homogeneity, centralisation, division, imitation and emotionality.

The advent of Web 2.0 made Surowiecki's observations highly topical. The collapse of financial markets suggests that the mob mentality is alive and well and casts doubt on Surowiecki's faith in market forces.

More: www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/jamessurowiecki