How Songs Get Popular

An anonymous reader writes "Researchers created an artificial music market of 14,341 participants split into two groups to pick music from unknown musicians. In one group, the individuals had only song titles and band names to go on. The individuals in the other group saw how others had rated the songs. Turns out popularity bred popularity, which explains why there's so much crap on the radio."

Comments

It's the Garmlich effect.

[rothic]

"It's the law of physics that states that if one girl screams for something, it will make other girls scream ... until all girls within a five-mile radius are screaming. Once you get girls screamin', you can't stop 'em! They're crazy!" --Chef, South Park

Re:It's the Garmlich effect.

[jrockway]

> If you don't like popular music, that doesn't make it "crap."

True. The fact that it's crap is what makes it crap.

"Nothing attracts a crowd..."

[no_opinion]

"... like a crowd."

Re:"Nothing attracts a crowd..."

[Aspirator]

Obligatory Monty Python Reference

Brian (Talking to crowd): You need to be independant minded.
Crowd: We are! We are!
Person in crowd: I'm not!

How else would we get

[BillFarber]

Air Supply?

GREAT!

[Shuh]

Now that I've posted, everyone is going to get in on this thread.

Ordinary fucking people

[Drunkulus]

I hate 'em

MOD PARENT UP EXTREME !!!!!1

[Anonymous Coward]

...and mod this down ULTRATROLL

Re:A social experiment

[gad_zuki!]

>You create a craze by convincing people they are missing out. Remember Beanie Babies?

People are mindless conformists! So what flavor of Linux do you run?

Really?

[PsychoBrat]

Well... let's see if it works; somebody mod this +1 Funny!