Fanagrams

The author Malcolm Gladwell defines an outlier as “something that is situated away from or classed differently from a main or related body.”  In his book of essays he focuses on the secrets of success for outliers.  Based on his vignettes, Gladwell implicitly defines success as wealth and/or celebrity.  The underlying message of Gladwell’s book is that no matter how smart, talented or athletically gifted you might be, your chances of breakout success will ultimately depend on an ineffable mix of family support, mentorship, cultural and societal environment factors and outright luck.  Gladwell profiles hockey players, techno wizards such as Bill Gates, lawyers, businessmen and the Beatles.

As a starting point, Gladwell posits that 10,000 hours of practice are required to hone expertise to an outlier level.  The Beatles reached this cutoff through hours of performing in the seedy strip clubs of Hamburg, Germany at the start of their career.  When they returned to England, they had gained the confidence and experience to burst onto the international stage.  Gladwell refers to Hamburg as the “crucible” of the Beatles’ success.

Over the last decade singing competitions have become a staple of network TV.  I decided to investigate whether Gladwell’s principles would apply in this age of social media and instant stardom.  The singing competition show The Voice became my test crucible.  The format consists of an initial round of blind auditions, in which four judges sit with their backs to the singers and turn their chairs if they like what they hear.  If multiple judges turn their chairs, the singers select one as their coach.  As the show progresses, singers are eliminated based on an audience vote until a winner is crowned midst floods of fluttering confetti.   

Could instant stardom circumvent the 10,000 hour rule and would this instant stardom prove durable, propelling the winners to a halftime Super Bowl performance, to struts along a Red Carpet, a People Magazine cover, a Wikipedia profile, celebrity endorsements of perfume, shoes, a couch or absorbent underwear? 

1.  What Gladwell missed:  For performing artists, outlier looks matter, but either end of the spectrum works fine.

In Gladwell’s world, looks don’t matter.  Money talks.   We don’t care what Bill Gates looks like; lawyers work behind the scenes.  J. P. Morgan, an outlier in the  the industrial revolution was disfigured by an enormous, bulbous nose due to the skin disease rhinophyma.  Nobody cared.

Singing competitions add the variable of the visual to the analysis of success.  Carrie Underwood, the season 5 winner of the related show American Idol, is perhaps the most celebrated winner.  She dabbled in music during high school, but there was no Hamburgian-like testing ground, no singing in front of hostile or raucous crowds, no 10,000 hours.  She walked onto the stage and let it rip

How much of Carrie Underwood’s success is related to va-va-va-voom good looks, skimpy outfits and amiable stage presence.  (She bizarrely admitted that she had a third nipple on her stomach and could cluck like a chicken.)  Would the Beatles have enjoyed the same level of swooning success if (let’s face it) the butt ugly Ringo Starr was the lead singer and cute-as-a-button Paul McCartney was the drummer relegated to the back row?  How much did their cheeky press conferences contribute to their success?

An unlikely physical appearance can also work to a performer’s advantage.  The Italian version of the voice featured a fully-habited nun (Christina Scuccia) singing a spritely version of Alicia Keys’ song, No One, with a phalanx of sister nuns bebopping along backstage. 

The audience, who saw the singer before the judges, went wild.  There was a collective jaw drop as judges turned their chairs to see a dancing nun wearing sensible shoes, her silver cross bouncing along her chest.  Yes, she had a fine voice, but so did a lot of plain looking contestants.  The nun became a fan favorite mostly because she was a nun, going on to sing such against-type stunt songs as “Girls Just Want to Have Fun,” and “Like a Virgin.” She won.

•  What Gladwell got right:   Success requires ancillary skills beyond the core singing talent – among them fierce ambition, stage presence, networking skills and the luck of mentorship.   

Tracking the careers of the winners suggests that Gladwell is correct.  The instant fame  of The Voice is not durable, with few going on to any more than modest success.  Sister Cristina ultimately left her monastery to pursue her singling career.  As of 2022, she was reported to be working as a waitress in Spain.

The Voice has been criticized for their failure to produce a breakout star.  Carson Daly, the host of The Voice, offers a more modest definition of success than Gladwell – success is anyone who can make a living doing what they love to do. 

•  Another thing that Gladwell got right:  The biases in The Voice voting process skew the critical ingredient of timing.     

Gladwell cites optimal timing as a key factor for success, as illustrated by junior hockey leagues in Canada.  Young players are slotted into different leagues based on a January 1^st age cut-off, giving those born in early January an up to 11-month head start in skills and development.  It is startling to see that the majority of players in each of the Canadian elite junior leagues have birthdays in January and February.  This age bias trickles into the pro ranks. 

I see the same factors at play in The Voice, not in the age of the contestant, but in the biased timing of voting.  During the live performances, viewers are invited to vote at any time during the show.  Therefore, those who perform first enjoy a longer voting window. 

The highly touted “Instant Save” presents a more troubling bias.  The two lowest vote getters from the previous show each perform one last song.  The vote between the two of them is only open for five minutes.  As the credits runs, the host Carson Daly, announces in his most solemn voice, “And America saves…”  America, my ass.  This scheme effectively disenfranchises those in Mountain and Pacific time zones since the show is tape-delayed by two hours.  The voting window closes before they can watch the show. 

The producers blithely note that viewers can still vote, but they are voting blind – an interesting voting strategy that, sadly, may be common in this country.  It is not surprising that country western singers, well represented in the Eastern time zone, are the most frequent winners of the Voice.  Gladwell notes that a receptive environment is critical for outlier success.  The Voice’s voting practice skews this environment.

Though not directly related to Gladwell’s thesis, there are other troubling features.  The Voice website invites “America” to vote more than once, up to ten times per email address.  The “one person/one vote” bedrock of our democracy, beaming brightly to the rest of the world, does not apply to The Voice.   Another quibble is a subtle form of bribery.  If you vote using The Voice official app, you will get an extra treat from the Peacock Streaming service.

• Gladwell is right again:  Where would we be without friends and family?  (But this is a no-brainer.)

Another Gladwellian theme is the grassroots support of family, friends and local mentors.  During the blind auditions, the camera pans offstage to a collection of family and friends who breathlessly anticipate a chair turn, followed by screaming, clapping, hugging and kissing the affable host Carson Daly.   In their brief bios and interviews, the contestants tearfully describe their roots in music and their families’ support. 

• Gladwell continues to be right, this time with a final flourish.

Gladwell provides unexpected insights into the secrets of success but the evolution from obscurity to the bright lights of celebrity and fortune is the most compelling part of the book.  I am more interested in the teenaged Bill Gates sneaking off at night to access the University of Washington computers.  I wish I had seen the Beatles live in the 1960s, but even better, I wish that I had seen them in Hamburg as they were accumulating their hours.  I hope (but no guarantee) that I would have appreciated their blossoming greatness. 

Raw talent is the most charming aspect of The Voice.   Contestants stumble onto the stage looking like they have wandered in off the street, their contestant numbers slapped haphazardly on their chests.  The microphone shakes, their voice quavers as they confess that this is their first live performance.    

As the show progresses the performances become polished and over rehearsed.  Contestants get makeovers, style advisors weigh in.  For her blind audition, a frumpy but spirited Susan Boyle clumped onto the stage wearing an ill-fitting shift dress with no discernible waist.  Her frizzy hair had an every-which-way part.  She fumbled when asked the simple question of the name of her village.  She seemed simple to the point of cognitive pathology.  The audience and judges began to smirk.  And then she sang a stunning rendition of “I Dreamed a Dream” to wild cheers and excitement from the audience and embarrassed appreciation from the judges.  By her next performance she had undergone a total make-over – sleek dyed hair, plucked eyebrows, sequined evening gown.  The inspiring innocence of her first performance had evaporated.

Charm wears off quickly.  My interest peters out. 

However, I highly recommend any of the following blind auditions for an inspirational start to the day.  Watch as the jaded and dismissive looks of judges turn to amazement when unpolished talent turns incandescent.

Susan Boyle:  I Dreamed a Dream

Danyl Johnson:   A Little Help from My Friends

Sister Cristina Scuccia:  No One

Chirstopher Maloney:  The Rose

Follow Liza Blue on:
Share:

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Subscribe: RSS

Taking Gladwell’s recipe for success and applying to the modern age of social media and instant fame.

Follow Liza Blue on:
Share:

This essay is part of a series applying the principles outlined in Malcolm Gladwell’s essay collections.  The Tipping Point examines the mysterious emergence of “social epidemics,” ranging from crime waves to fashion trends.  As noted in the introduction, “Ideas and products and messages and behaviors spread just like viruses do.”  The following discussion applies the social epidemic principles to the persistent rumor (at least one would hope) that Russian Empress, Catherine the Great, had sex with horses. 

I first heard this rumor in 1971, as a newly arrived freshman from an all girls’ high school.  I stood timidly in my college cafeteria wondering where I might sit among this melee of strangers and further wondering where I might fit into this Southern California college. 

****

The dark wood paneling of the enormous dining hall extends up to the vaulted ceiling.  Students’ voices echo excitedly as they greet each other and sit in clumps of roommates, classmates, teammates, fraternities or sororities.  I draw in my breath and sit at a random table of five, nerve-wracking enough, but better than forlornly sitting by myself hoping that someone might like the look of me and join me.  The three guys are all vintage 1970 college students with long unkempt hair, white T-shirts and faded and patched blue jeans.  I am pleased to see that I blend well with the two other girls at the table, wearing low hip hugger jeans, a thick leather belt with a huge brass buckle that pinches when I lean over, well-tended long hair, and an embroidered Mexican wedding shirt. 

The five students glance at me quickly and continue talking.  One of the guys says, “Hey, did you hear about Catherine the Great?”  I have a vague awareness of the Russian Empress but know nothing specific.  “Did you know that she used to have sex with horses?” 

Another guy chips in, “She died when a horse crushed her.” 

The sexual content of this conversation is uncharted territory.  What am I supposed to do with this information?  How can I add to this discussion?  Is this what college is going to be like? 

Thankfully, it turns out that Catherine the Great’s sex life is a conversation killer.  Perhaps we all take a few seconds to privately contemplate the provocative logistics of the scenario, but the conversation promptly moves on to something as mundane as the poor quality of cafeteria food.  I never speak of this again, merely snug the nugget in the back of my mind. 

******

Forty years later, I was reading a book titled Paris in Love, a collection of diary entries by the romance novelist Eloisa James, who wrote about the cultural challenges for her family during a sabbatical year in Paris in 2009.   In the midst of very homey entries, she notices her husband is reading a biography of Catherine the Great, and comments, “His book also didn’t seem like much fun, especially after I inquired about the one thing that I knew about Catherine – to wit, her purported erotic encounters with equines.”

I was stunned.  What I had heard at the cafeteria was not a local rumor concocted by a bored student in a Russian history class, but a rumor that had been circulating internationally for a good 250 years.  I then casually asked my husband Nick what he knew about Catherine the Great, and Boom! there it was again.  When I discretely questioned my peers a good fifty percent knew all about Mr. Ed.  And just as it was in the college cafeteria, once you drop the horse bomb, you have to move on to something else.  Coincidentally, I had just finished reading Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point.  Applying Gladwell’s principles on rumor propagation to  Catherine the Great emerged as an interesting exercise.

Gladwell points out that rumors address a number of social needs, including confronting fears or trying to make sense out of a confusing situation.  Workplace rumors about rightsizing, downsizing or total collapse fall into this category.  These types of rumor may be based on a misinterpretation or embellishment of facts.  And then there are rumors that are based on deliberate misinformation, perhaps from a disgruntled employee, a romantic or political rival or jealous competitor.  In the case of Catherine the Great, let’s hope we’re dealing with deliberate misinformation, but then from who?  There was no shortage of political rivals – Polish nobility, for example, many of whom were understandably disenchanted as Catherine slowly divvied up their country.  However, I think that a romantic rival is the best bet for the initial propagator.

Step One:  Rumor Initiation

Catherine, a minor German princess, was plucked from obscurity at age 14 to marry Grand Duke Peter, the grandson of Peter the Great and heir to the throne.  Upon arrival in Russia, she was immediately repulsed by her fiancé, whose genetic ugliness was further accentuated by a recent bout of small pox. 

According to Catherine’s sympathetic biographer, Robert Massie, the wedding was certainly loveless and possibly never consummated. Grand Duke Peter then took a mistress, Elizaveta Vorontsova, promising that she would become empress after he divorced Catherine.  However, Peter’s drunken, abusive and childish behavior – he loved to play with toy soldiers marching across his bed – alienated the nobility.  He was forced to abdicate, and shortly after that he was murdered, though Massie states that it is unclear whether Catherine specifically ordered the killing.  Mistress Elizaveta subsequently married a mere colonel, and spent the next 30 years of her life in bitterness and ill health. 

Downsized Elizaveta gets my vote for the romantic rival starting the rumor.

Step Two:  The Law of the Few

Gladwell outlines three basic components of propagation – the law of the few, the power of context, and the stickiness factor.  The law of the few describes how a rumor travels.  The context and stickiness describe the content of the rumor, how believable it is. 

Gladwell identifies three categories of the “few,” i.e., mavens, connectors and salesmen.  Mavens are information brokers, who have their ear to the ground for all the latest trends and gossip.  The information is then passed to a connector, who is one of those people who seems to know everybody through multiple different walks of life.  Salesmen are the persuaders, the type of charismatic people that the average person just wants to believe.  In this digital age mavens, connectors and salesmen can be collectively categorized as “influencers.” 

In Catherine the Great’s vast court, it is easy to imagine that political intrigue and multiple agendas could produce a percolating network willing to spread a rumor to sabotage the interloping Empress.   

Step Three:  The Power of Context

While Catherine the Great’s rumor might have gone viral within the Russian court, there must have been something about it that prompted the rumor to spread beyond the court, beyond Russia itself, making the leap to Western Europe and beyond.  Here is where the power of context comes in.  According to Gladwell, context is “sensitive to the conditions and circumstances of the times and places in which they occur.”  Basically, our environment primes us to accept or reject a rumor.  As much as Catherine tried to modernize Russia along the model of Western Europe, her country was still the menacing and mysterious country right across the border. 

Catherine wanted Russia to be considered among the enlightened European countries, but she couldn’t overcome the barriers of culture and geography.  The “otherness” of Russia and the fear it inspired created a receptive environment for the rumor. 

Europe was primed and ready to believe the worst about Catherine.

Step Four:  Durabilty of Context

Gladwell notes that rumors tend to be ephemeral, petering out after the truth is revealed, or the context changes or people just lose interest.  However, the 250 year duration of  rumor might set a record, perhaps because the context has not changed.  Russia is still the feared country.  When I first heard the story in 1971, Russia was the unpredictable giant, a vodka-soaked country, speaking a mysterious guttural and spitty language that has a chronic shortage of vowels and oversupply of “v’s.”  It was the brutish and boorish country of Stalin, followed by Nikita Khrushchev, who distinguished himself by taking his shoe off at a UN meeting and banging it on the table to make a point.  Now we are treated to visions of a shirtless Putin riding a horse.  The context persists.

As a country, we are still ready to believe anything about those crazy Ruskies.  

Step Five:  Stickiness Factor

Stickiness refers to how the original rumor may be modified and embellished to make it more memorable.  The starting point of the rumor might have been a mean-spirited comment by mistress Elizaveta saying something along the lines of, “That Catherine, she’s in love with horses, she has a whole stable of them, never rides side saddle like all ladies should, and have you noticed that all of her favorites come from the army’s Horse Guards, plus she kind of looks like a horse.  I’m surprised she doesn’t whinny at night, if you know what I mean.”  At this early stage, the comment still contains a kernel of truth. Catherine had a consuming love for horses.  This fact is not disputed. 

In the next step, the rumor is “leveled” by deleting all the details for understanding the true meaning of the story – basically the bitter musing of a deposed mistress – and then exaggerating other details to add some juice, i.e. sex.  Gladwell notes that distortion of facts is universal in the spread of rumors. 

Horses scare me, but I recognize they can prompt intense emotional attachments among their owners.  Yes, horses can be beautiful.  And compelling.  And provocative.  Now I envision it.  It was those dark eyes and shimmering muscles that sharpened the rumor to its salacious level while still retaining a tiny kernel of  believability.  The horse is the perfect animal.  No other barnyard animal could have sustained the rumor across continents and centuries.  The stickiness is not about Catherine or her romantic or political rivals. 

The stickiness, the believability, is all about the horse, of course. 

Follow Liza Blue on:
Share: