Morrie the Toupee Salesman

Jay Adelson, CEO of digg, is hilarious sometimes. In this interview about the digg revolt, he comes up with the novel theory that it wasn’t actually a revolt because there wasn’t a statistically significant number of users involved. This kind of sent me down a rabbit hole to see how many revolts involve a statistically insignificant number of people. Here’s a few:

The Gunpowder Plot (UK) – 11 people

John Brown at Harper’s Ferry (USA) – 19 people

Even the American Revolution started with the Boston Tea Party, with 8,000 people (still a statistically insignificant part of the British Empire).

In fact, I’d say that, as a rule, rebellions ALWAYS start with a statistically insignificant part of a group. But Jay’s invocation of statistics could be a new and novel approach for real dictators and bad guys everywhere – usually they just say “extremists” or “terrorists” or “dead-enders” (a Bushco favorite). I’d suggest that “statistically not significant” is a phrase that every leader out there fighting real rebellions will embrace.