Malcolm Gladwell LetsRun Shoutout on JRE

Haha, Malcolm was on a roll about marathon cheats and JR starts talking about mind reading technology. #classic

Maybe Malcolm can chime in and have a "hot take" Don't expect every book to be so moving. Read, comprehend, and use/don't use to some that's good others "meh"

A guy who was writing columns for the times wasn't too sure about being an author then a publishing company gave a million and said make it happen shortly thereafter 3million copies sold.

I believe at one of his humble signings he said a lot of the inspiration comes from just intersecting interests with the historical stories. This is probably why corporations have him as a speaker to keep employees engaged and to learn about the history of "Hoity Toity"

What percent of Gladwell haters on here are just peanut butter and jelly?

AdiVector wrote:

Maybe Malcolm can chime in and have a "hot take" Don't expect every book to be so moving. Read, comprehend, and use/don't use to some that's good others "meh"

A guy who was writing columns for the times wasn't too sure about being an author then a publishing company gave a million and said make it happen shortly thereafter 3million copies sold.

I believe at one of his humble signings he said a lot of the inspiration comes from just intersecting interests with the historical stories. This is probably why corporations have him as a speaker to keep employees engaged and to learn about the history of "Hoity Toity"

If your job got Gladwell to come talk to you about his book to get you engaged, then your boss missed the point of the book. Maybe next week I'll ask my boss if they can get Wayne Gretzky to come to my job. He can stand on the stage and say, "I was born in January, that's how I scored so many goals".

Bad Wiggins ran at Drake.

Malcom did not run at Drake.

aladan wrote:

My real problem with Gladdwell is he passes himself off as this smart guy

A Gladwell-style column should be written about the phenomenon of people hating on Gladwell for failing to meet up to really high intellectual/academic standards. How exactly does he pass himself off as such a serious academic? I guess it's a demeanor or way of speaking or something, but ultimately it's just his style, not something substantive. It's not fair to hate him for just being himself.

For example, if he was in a room with a bunch of random people trying to explain marathon investigation, he would do his best and it'd sound like a professor teaching marathon investigation 101 or whatever. He'd probably get a few things slightly wrong too, possibly something majorly wrong. But he'd do his best and refer people to the site to learn more. But if Derek is also in that room, he would be humble and quiet and let Derek do the talking. Maybe he'd ask some questions of Derek, but not as way to one-up him or criticize him, but out of genuine curiosity or to produce what he thinks would be a valuable response from Derek. There's no arrogance or whatever.

He is like a 3:00:00 guy with the Kipchoge arm sleeves, compression shorts, and next%'s. Doesn't mean he thinks he's Kipchoge.

I swear some people think it's worse to read a Gladwell book than watch Jersey Shore or something, because they're afraid of people thinking that they think Gladwell is an expert and not just a writer, whereas with Jersey Shore they expect people to know they're watching it "ironically".

Malcolm was a champion age group runner in Toronto. One of the best.

I enjoy his books and interviews. I get a lot of useful ideas from hearing his views.

I don't trust Canadians. Especially, those that write screenplays based on running.

T.M.A D.D.D.H.A.S.F.N.E.

BLAME CANADA! BLAME CANADA!

Where's Greg?

the idea that i am Bad Wiggins has to be the most hilarious thing I have ever read on letsrun

Tarantula surprise wrote:

Not a fan wrote:

The man? He goes by Bad Wiggins on this forum and comes off as an angry know it all that passes heaps of uninformed opinion off as fact. The guy is a total d!ck.

I thought the same thing. Didn't he admit it in an old thread somewhere? And yes, he doesn't seem to be a very nice person if that is indeed him. Maybe he's just 'anonymously' expressing angst like so many here.

You guys are mixing things up. He did admit his username a while back but it wasn’t Bad Wiggins, it was actually ventolin^3.

skinnycanadian wrote:

the idea that i am Bad Wiggins has to be the most hilarious thing I have ever read on letsrun

Is that youMalcolm? I love 'Revisionist History'.

From a 2013 thread.

Bryan wrote:

The September 2013 issue of Runner's World has a really good Q&A with Malcolm Gladwell, who turns out to have been quite a solid young runner, and is very thoughtful about our sport.

The money quote, though, pops up on pg. 79, where he says, "Because I'm such a running junkie, I was on letsrun.com, my favorite Web site, watching video of Mo Farah in Kenya."

[hi Malcolm]

skinnycanadian wrote:

the idea that i am Bad Wiggins has to be the most hilarious thing I have ever read on letsrun

Lol awesome

That's actually another example, you see Wayne never did an elaborate celebration because it was January he was at tournaments, then ultimately on the road playing pro. Wayne never had time to have traditional birthdays it was during season, tournaments, road, etc. Do you see the point? Interesting facts with history...Another one comes to mind, back in the 50s scientists were investigating all of these drinkers who would black out what they found were those who would physically pass out and those who would still function but have no account. In both of these groups the Hippocampus was completely shut down.

This all may come across as meh but what makes him a great author is not so much the story, but the ability to put it together. I guess that's why Podcasting and narrating his own Audiobooks have taken off not to mention this thread!

Earlier poster had a great idea having the Brojos on JRE discussing NOP, doping, and these message boards!

smarterthanyou wrote:

Sorry, but it doesn't take hindsight to recognize that you cannot consistently and significantly beat the market over the long term and promise stellar returns going forward. No shortage of gullible ( "stupid" ) investors.

This is exactly what hindsight bias means, chief: the past looks pre-determined and obvious. The reality is that very smart people invested in Bernie, not because they were dumb, but because they thought that someone could, wait for it, be an outlier.

Even if you don't like MG's books, I'd highly recommend these Grantland articles he did with Bill Simmons:

https://grantland.com/features/gladwell-vs-simmons-v/

MG, when can we get another one of these?

This guy is one of the biggest kooks in the "intellectual" world today. In one of his books, he actually published a half-baked theory of why all the players on an NHL team were born in the second half of the year. According , being born later in the year meant members of this group were a few months older than their peers in their gradeschool class, and were therefore a bigger and more physically mature, resulting in more attention from their coaches, which helped them to meet the "10,000 hour rule" faster. I seriously can't believe that anyone could be this stupid. It is the single stupidest theory of anything I have ever heard, including Christian creationism. When I see creationist museums with scenes Christ riding on the back of a triceratops, I think that's less stupid than Malcom Gladwell's books. Anyone who's not a complete idiot knows that genetics, not practice, is the biggest determinant of athletic success. There is in fact no scientific support for the so-called "10,000 hour rule," it is nothing more than something some crackpot academic like himself pulled out of his #ss. No credible scientist or professional intellectual would ever cite such idiocy as fact. The influence of genetics far outweighs a few month's age difference as determinant of physical size and physical maturity. And if this half-baked theory was valid, why don't we see this pattern in every professional sport, not just one ONE hockey team? In summary, Malcom Gladwell is an idiot, and it's no surprise that his political views are also socialist. Thanks for reading.

Gladwell's greatest talent is stealing all my best material and turning it into $$$.