Whatmakesahit?Manyassumeithastodowithartistryorluck.No...

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What makes a hit? Many assume it has to do with artistry or luck. Not so，says Derek Thompson, a writer and editor at the Atlantic. In his first book，“Hit Makers”，he analyses the psychology and economics of pop culture and argues that “hits” the things that get everybody talking— are based on three rules that rely on more than discovering or introducing new ideas alone.

First, consumers desire “familiar surprises' Studies show that people opt for things they recognise over things they do not. Maybe there is an evolutionary explanation for this: survival taught humans that if they had seen an animal before, it had not killed them yet. This familiarity was comforting. The evidence for people's response to recognition is everywhere: the Star Wars franchise, for example is a combination of characters and themes from older films. But it remains a fine balance, as people enjoy thinking they have found something new—the “aha” moment, as Mr Thompson calls it.

Second, going “virar” overnight is a myth. Real hits rely on a series of closely connected events: a celebrity picking up a tweet and sharing it with countless followers, for example. Friends and family alone are unlikely to help you reach the scale you need (unless, of course, they are extremely InfLuential). “Rock Around the Clock' a rock'n'noll classic, was completely unrecognized when it was first made available to the public. Yet thanks to one music obsessed teenager and his movie-star father, the song was picked as the opening track to a notorious film called “Blackboard Jungle”，which helped it achieve international fame.

Third, technology may evolve, but people's longing for the popular does net. Music labels used to bribe(賄賂）radio stations to play their songs, thus ensuring their success. This meant the labels could dictate the hits. Today the internet offers a seemingly infinite readily available music, yet people tend to stick to songs that other people like. One study from Columbia University found that a song at the top of the charts stayed there precisely because people assumed it was good, When the charts were inverted, those previously at the bottom achieved similar success. The quality of the song is not as important as its perceived(感知的)popularity.

Mr Thompson's thesis might seem obvious a feet be readily admits. Exposure and connections are important. But the extent to which nearly all pop hits owe their success to this may be less clear-cut than is generally believed. Mr Thompson's skills for supporting each point with colourful tales and examples help make the book worthwhile. He explains how “Bal du Mou lin de la Galette" by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, which is respected as one of the masterpieces of the Impressionist movement, would not have been so without Gustave Caillebotte, a fellow artist Cailiebotte died at 45 and left nearly 70 of his friends, paintings to the French state, including several by Renoir, thus helping ensure his exposure and eventual critical praise.

Readers may despair at the injustice of publicity (宣傳）bearing more fruit than pure talent, but there are enough unlikely examples to foster hope. Indeed, In theory, anyone with the right mix of “newness”，wide reach and repeated exposure can get their lucky break. Better still, it might just be a hit.