The Long Tail/Anderson 9-11

10 When “The Long Tail” was published in Wired in October 2004, it quickly became the most cited article the magazine had ever run. The three main observations---(1) the tail of available variety is far longer than we realize; (2) it’s now within reach economically; (3) all those niches, when aggregated, can make up a significant market—seemed indisputable, especially backed up with heretofore unseen data.

11…it’s clear that the story of the Long Tail is really about the economics of abundance—what happens when the bottlenecks that stand between supply and demand in our culture start to disappear and everything become available to everyone.
Our growing affluence has allowed us to shift from being bargain shoppers buying branded (or even unbranded) commodities to becoming mini-connoisseurs, flexing our taste with a thousand little indulgences that set us apart from others