"Outliers:The Story of Success" annotations

Chapter one: "The Roseto Mystery"

Why were the citizens of Roseto Pennsylvania so much healthier than any of their neighbors? What made them "outliers," or different from the rest?

In chapter one, Malcolm Gladwell focuses on the importance of social activity to our general health. The citizens of Roseto were not eating any healthier, being more active than others and although they had all immigrated from Roseto, Italy, their relatives living in Italy still were not particularly healthy like they were. Physician Stewart Wolf found that the main difference was how these people interacted with/care for each other. Large families lived together under one roof, neighbors cooked for each other...they all communicated with one another. The Rosetans "had created a powerful, protective social structure capable of insulating them from the pressures of the modern world."p9

Favorite quote: "[T]he values of the world we inhabit and the people we surround ourselves with have a profound effect on who we are." pg 11

The success in this story was the success of being healthy and living a long life.

Chapter two focuses on financial success.

The outlier in this chapter is the field of computer programming. According to Gladwell, this is a field where you rise up the ladder merely on your talent, your family could not buy your success in this field.

However, Gladwell seems to contradict himself. You cannot exactly be poor to succeed. You have to be presented with opportunities to "practice your 10,000 [paraphrased]." If you are poor you aren't going to have the ability (like Gates) to attend Lakeside, a private school with a computer. You also have to be born at the right time (to be financially successful).

For me, the main focus on chapter two was on the idea that talent is necessary, but practice is the most important and luck (opportunities to practice) is necessary as well. For someone to have a lot of success, they must have a little talent (that will get them focused on a certain area, ex: Beatles=music, Gates/Joy=computers/math)...then they have to have someone who supports this talent (by giving them opportunities to practice).

Favorite quote: "[W]hat truly distinguishes their histories is not their extraordinary talent but their extraordinary opportunities."