One chapter (as part of a defense of the multicultural critiques) states that the multicultural critiques of literature are analogous to recovered memories of child sexual abuse. That doesn’t make for a very persuasive argument in 2007.

I don’t think most PR problems are ones where lying is needed. Consider selling the Zune. It probably isn’t as good as an ipod but it had a lot of different features that the Microsoft PR guys would like to point out to people. The factors that the Heath brothers discuss could have been useful.

I just ordered “Cultural Selection” from Abebooks where it is real cheap.

So, try it. It would be an interesting sociological experiment: Come up with 10 or 12 different ideas, vary them on the dimensions that you’d like to measure, send out the newly-crafted urban legends to your email list (preferably your non-academic friends, I suppose), and see how long it takes for a relative or neighbor to send you the same urban legend.

(I wonder if successful rumor propagation isn’t essentially the same question as hit movies, popular songs and bestselling books.)

I should add, though, that Gary Alan Fine once wrote an interesting piece on commodity rumors (which I drew on for a scholarly piece I wrote on the subject much later) where he pointed out that some of the most common food and product rumors actually have a relatively minor basis in fact–he found a couple of court cases in which foreign objects/unusual meats were found to have been in fried fast food, for example. But real cases don’t explain why certain stories and rumors propagate so readily and powerfully.

That said, I don’t think it’s at all unreasonable for the Heaths to not address lies; from what you say (I haven’t read the book myself), it sounds like they’re concentrating on what makes communication work; the kind of malinformation the story from the Microsoft rep you link to engages in by definition doesn’t stick. He’s covering up, everybody knows it, and there’s nothing we can do about it. For it to stick by the Heath’s definition, I suspect they’d require that a lot of people believe him, and I think you’d have to work fairly hard to find anyone that does.

As for power, well, power matters, but it’s not the primary mover of an idea. It can make you aware of something you otherwise wouldn’t have heard of, but it can’t make you like it– the message itself has to appeal, at least somewhat. Power can make a marginal idea popular, but I don’t believe it can make a truly bad one popular. Of course, that’s a poor argument, as I can easily claim any idea that’s popular is by definition not “truly bad”, but I think we’re dealing with slightly looser arguments here. 🙂

There’s probably a way to sell any idea or meme, if you think on it.

BSE. Canada has had trouble with the disease. Their cattle products are viewed with suspicion by those who are focused on this issue. I can imagine some clever Heathian rumor sticking, at least for a while, even though it is a scientific absurdity.

Not that this contradicts you points. It may make them a bit less sticky though.