Rating: 
Summary: Relevant and surprising
Review: Although the subtitle to THE WISDOM OF CROWDS is an awkward mouthful, it is at least accurate: the book does an exceptional job of illuminating a remarkably wide range of material from politics, everyday life, and the business world. Surowiecki's not offering a grand unified theory of everything, but in the course of investigating how and when groups and crowds are and are not intelligent, he takes you on an exhilarating ride. You can't go more than a couple of pages without coming across some interesting factual tidbit or clever anecdote. Just a short list of stuff Surowiecki writes about includes: crowds on city sidewalks, Navy men trying to find a lost submarine, the Nielsen ratings, Google, scientists trying to find the SARS virus, the stock market, game-show audiences, fashion stores, and the C.I.A. Thankfully, though, he understands that just stringing together stories isn't enough. Instead, he fits his examples into a strong argument that holds the book together. You can get a lot out of this book just by dipping into individual chapters, but reading it from beginning to end is a powerful experience.One of the things about the book that hasn't been much remarked on is the light it sheds on the flaws in the way the U.S. intelligence community -- and, I would argue, the Bush administration -- approaches the problem of forecasting the future and making good decisions. The book's main subject is the wisdom of crowds, but Surowiecki spends a lot of time on how groups go wrong, and his discussion of how groups make bad decisions seems to me completely relevant to our current problems. When Surowiecki delves into groupthink, into the pressure that's exerted on lower-level employees to conform, and the perils of too little diversity of opinion, he's making a broader point about what good decisions require. But in the process, he clarified for me just why the current administration did such a bad job of figuring out whether Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and of planning for the postwar period. I was surprised, but it turns out this book has a lot to say about the state we're in right now.
Rating:
Summary: great book
Review: great book. the author makes the effort to go deeply into the subject. A must read even if you disagree with him.
Rating:
Summary: Intriguing and useful
Review: I decided to read this book after reading an essay that Surowiecki wrote in Wired, arguing that companies and organizations in general put too much trust in the people at the very top and don't rely enough on the collective intelligence of their employees. This is exactly how things are run at the agency where I work. Information doesn't flow the way it should, decisions are made by fiat, and people are more interested in protecting their little fiefdoms than in solving problems intelligently. I was intrigued by the article's argument, but I wanted more detail. After reading the whole book, I'm convinced that the way we do things makes our decisions worse, not better. THE WISDOM OF CROWDS mounts a great case for the virtues of letting more people have a say in decisions, and it does so in a remarkably entertaining way. I thought there was a nice balance between anecdote and analysis here, with the stories -- including a great one about finding a lost submarine, and a detailed analysis of the Columbia disaster -- really illuminating Surowiecki's arguments. Because Surowiecki is challenging the idea that only a few select people should have influence over important decisions, it may be hard for his ideas to have an impact in the corporate and government world. But I'm convinced that this should change for good the way organizations make decisions.
Rating: 
Summary: Pseudoscience
Review: I didn't finish this book, cos I thought it would be a waste of my time. I was not convinced from the first page to the last page I read. While the idea is interesting, the overly varied examples don't prove much except sloppiness. If I missed the point, then the author has obviously done a very bad job at explaining his concept. He tries to pass off aggregation, independence and one other thing as basic conditions as though there is some science involved here, but the meaning of all three are not defined, so I find them useless in understanding the examples raised. The arguments are not structured in a way that would convince a skeptical reader. Interesting idea though.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: I'm a big fan of James Surowiecki's "Financial Page" column in The New Yorker. He's consistently able to come up with unusual takes on seemingly familiar topics, and he has a great knack for making business stories compelling and entertaining as well as understandable. But because it's only a page long, I sometimes come away from the column wanting more, and I always wondered how Surowiecki would do if he was able to develop his ideas and arguments more fully. Luckily, "The Wisdom of Crowds" lives up to all my expectations. It's wonderfully readable, full of terrific stories, funny, and its basic argument -- that groups, under certain conditions, can make better decisions than even the smartest individuals -- is counterintuitive without being willfully contrarian. The roots of the argument obviously stem from the way markets work -- buyers and sellers find each other and reach efficient outcomes without anyone being in charge, while the stock market (at least some of the time) does as good a job as possible of setting prices. But what I really like is the way Surowiecki extends this argument way beyond business and markets, showing how collective wisdom can be seen (and can potentially be used) in a host of other situations, including the racetrack, on the Internet, and on city streets. He also does a good job of drawing out the possible implications of this for everything from the U.S. intelligence community to the way companies are run. This is definitely a big-idea book, but the author is cautious in laying out his evidence, and is careful to show that groups, even if they're potentially wise, are often stupid and dangerous. The chapter on small groups in particular, which focuses on NASA's mismanagement of the Columbia mission, is powerful stuff, and useful to anyone interested in how to run a meeting well (or badly, for that matter). The least satisfying part of the book is the chapter on democracy, where Surowiecki shies away from pushing his conclusion to its logical end. But on the whole, this is just a wonderful book, elegant and enlightening. If you're interested in this book, it's also worth checking out Paul Seabright's "The Company of Strangers" and Robert Wright's "Nonzero."
Rating:
Summary: A Counter-Intuitive Notion
Review: In 1906, Francis Galton, known for his work on statistics and heredity, came across a weight-judging contest at the West of England Fat Stock and Poultry Exhibition. This encounter was to challenge the foundations of his life's study. An ox was on display and for six-pence fair-goers could buy a stamped and numbered ticket, fill in their names and their guesses of the animal's weight after it had been slaughtered and dressed. The best guess received a prize. Eight hundred people tried their luck. They were diverse. Many had no knowledge of livestock; others were butchers and farmers. In Galton's mind this was a perfect analogy for democracy. He wanted to prove the average voter was capable of very little. Yet to his surprise, when he averaged the guesses, the total came to 1197 pounds. After the ox had been slaughtered, it weighted 1198. James Surowiecki takes Galton's counterintuitive notion and explores its ramification for business, government, science and the economy. It is a book about the world as it is. At the same time, it is a book about the world as it might be. Most of us believe that valuable nuggets of knowledge are concentrated in few minds. We believe the solution to our complex problems lies in finding the right person. When all we have to do, Surowiecki demonstrates over and over, is ask the gathered crowd. The well-written book is divided into two parts. The first deals with theory; the second offers case studies. Believe it or not, I found it to be a page-turner. The author has that precious ability to render the complex in simple, understandable and interesting prose. I have long been an admirer of H. L. Mencken who once wrote, "No one is this world, so far as I know, has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people." By the time I finished this book, I believed Mencken was wrong.
Rating:
Summary: Refreshingly optimistic
Review: It seems naive to mention it, but one of the things I liked best about Surowiecki's take on the intelligence of groups is how optimistic it is. Most of what we hear about crowds and democracy and the potential of average people offers a dismal picture. But I came away from this book in a hopeful mood, and infused with a sense of real possibility. Surowiecki is convincing on the idea that the intelligence of Google, or bettors at the race track, or the audience in "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" aren't peculiar anomalies, but are actually connected by the fact that they're tapping into collective wisdom. This makes me think that if we can figure out a way how to use group intelligence in a wider way -- inside companies, governments, whatever -- the decisions society as a whole makes can be improved. Stylistically, the book is a delight. The sentences are crisp, and the stories are well-told. Occasionally, Surowiecki makes his ideas too involved and ends up in a digression. But I forgave this because it felt like the result of someone who thinks everything is interesting and wants the reader to feel the same. Wonderful stuff.
Rating: 
Summary: Eye Opening
Review: Most of the time, we rely upon "experts" who make decisions that affect the collective whole. Mr. Surowiecki presents a very compelling argument that collective wisdom often leads to a better result than reliance upon a chosen few. Thus, markets operate best when they are free from thousands of people work together to price goods, rather than allowing insiders to determine them. Similarly, betting lines in Vegas normally hit the mark because they are adjusted to react to the fans' betting patterns, rather than relying upon a few insiders to determine where the spread will fall. After reading this book, I will continue to listen to the opinions of those who have specialized knowledge, but I realize that it becomes very dangerous to discount the influence of groups when making important decisions. The book bogged down a bit in the later chapters and some of Mr. Surowiecki's conclusions appear more based on anecdotal evidence that verifiable science, but I was entertained and intrigued by almost everything he cited.
Rating: 
Summary: ok, but not worth investing in
Review: only faintly interesting. not well written. oh well. I'll keep searching.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating Concept - Well Written - Almost 5 Stars
Review: Surowiecki got the first element of literary success right by picking a good subject. The idea that random groups of people have an incredible collective wisdom that can be tapped into under the right conditions is truly interesting. Surowiecki then goes on to get the second piece of the puzzle right - he tells a good story. His real-world examples of the wisdom of crowds in action are engaging and really capture your imagination and make you consider the power and possibilities of the wisdom of crowds -- which is where this book falls a little short of five stars.
If this book only closed by suggesting a practical approach to implementing the wisdom of crowds in new and different situations, helping readers tap into the power of the concept, this would be a five star book. It falls slightly short but is still absolutely worth the read.
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