Is Justin Timberlake the product of Cumulative Advantage?

Joshua Porter blogs about a study by Duncan Watts called "Is Justin Timberlake the product of Cumulative Advantage?" (the title being a shrewd piece of Search Engine Optimisation if ever I saw it ; ). The study describes "a sociology experiment that has huge implications for the display of aggregate data on social web sites". In Joshua's words:

Aggregate displays are everywhere, from the book ratings at Amazon.com to the most-emailed articles at the New York Times to the number of diggs at Digg.com. They’re a primary element of social design. They not only let people know how their actions relate to others, but they also alter the behavior of those who view them.

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[The] result [of the study] could be seen as a confirmation of the bandwagon effect, a known bias resulting from our tendency to follow the crowd. This bias is probably the result of ignorance…if we don’t know something we tend to rely on the opinion of others. In this case users probably paid attention to the download numbers because they didn’t have any prior experience with the music.

We identify with things and people we see others identifying with. Like super-intelligent sheep. Ok, the super-intelligent bit is moot. ; )