The Long Tail cover
  1. Introduction
  2. iTunes Killed The Radio Star
  3. The 98 Percent Rule
  4. How Technology Is Turning Mass Markets Into Millions Of Niches
  5. The End Of The Hit Parade
  6. Long Tails Everywhere
  7. Make It, Get It Out There, And Help Me Find It
  8. The Wikipedia Phenomenon
  9. Lonely Island
  10. The Ants Have Megaphones. What Are They Saying?
  11. The Wal-Mart Effect
  12. We Are Entering An Era Of Unprecedented Choice. And That's A Good Thing
  13. What's It Like To Live In A Long Tail World?
  14. Video After Television
  15. eBay - How Far Can The Niche Revolution Reach?
  16. Coda: Tomorrow's Tail
  17. Exclusive: The Latest On The Long Tail

This site contains edited extracts from Chris Anderson's acclaimed business book The Long Tail, published in the U.K. by Random House.

The ideas from this book have spread quickly beyond just the web - and are now part of the very way we look at business and culture in the 21st century.

We urge you to read and share these ideas under the Creative Commons terms below.

(You could also just buy the book )

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution - Noncommercial - No Derivative Works 3.0 License.

An Apt Studio site.

Read Chris Anderson's Long Tail Blog

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The Long Tails Of Fashion, Travel and Food

Fashion turns out to be a great example, ranging from the existing niche markets of boutique and couture (which launch the trends that will eventually make it to the Short Head of mass-market retail) to the emerging markets of vintage clothing (eBay is the largest retailer of that) and DIY t-shirt design on sites such as Threadless.com.

Travel is another. The cut-price airline boom led by the likes of EasyJet and RyanAir has essentially lowered the cost of distribution for millions of travelers who are now visiting cities and regions outside of the tourism mainstream, from Eastern Europe to smaller cities and towns in Western Europe.

Then there’s the exploding market for organic and ‘artisanal’ food, which started as a microniche in markets such as my native Berkeley and the Slow Food movement around small Italian farms and has now gone mainstream through Whole Foods. The sight of Wal-Mart scrambling to source enough organic milk to satisfy the demand from its millions of Middle America customers is a dramatic example of how quickly Long Tail forces can reach the Head.

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‘Read this brilliant and timely book if you want to get a look at the future of business’
Eric Schmidt, CEO, Google

‘The natural successor to the “tipping point” in the field of big business ideas’
Guardian

"The ideas in this book are going to be talked about for the next ten years... get a copy now. It's worth it." Seth Godin

The Long Tail is now available in paperback. You can buy direct from Random House UK, Amazon.co.uk and Waterstones, or find it in any good bookstore.

Read more about The Long Tail

The Long Tail cover