I usually like Godin's writing, but this book is embarrassingly useless.

This book dates from 2001 and he is still right about most of what he talks about. The only thing is: Palm Pilots are gone and Tommy Hilfiger is irrelevant, and mp3’s are now ubiquitous, but that’s the nature of the idea virus.
Ideas, products and rumours spread super fast through the Internet these days. Godin calls it an ‘idea virus’. Look how fast the whole world was arguing about what color a dress was? I saw people comment that they could hear their neighbors arguing about it. Some people came to blows.
And it all started with one photo. That’s an idea virus.
Go shopping with a teen and they will tell you quick smart which is the ‘right’ brand of shoes to wear this season.
These days authors are discovered with perma-free first books in a series. Musicians upload their recorded efforts to a website where anyone can download their music for free and listen. Those listeners could be fans or record executives, or DJ’s looking for things for their play-list.
link: triple J Unearthed

Twenty years ago, the top 100 companies in the Fortune 500 either dug something out of the ground or turned a natural resource (iron ore or oil) into something you could hold. Today, fewer than half of the companies on the list do that. The rest make unseemly profits by trafficking in ideas.

Whoa…
You need to spread your idea, and then lock people into your ‘version’ of it so that you kill the competition. And you need to get the idea past the people who don’t care about new or trendy things, but just want a product that works.
And of course, Seth always puts his money where his mouth is. At regular intervals through the book the following appears and it is highlit in bright yellow.

STEAL THIS IDEA!
Here’s what you can do to spread the word about Unleashing the Ideavirus:
1. Send this file to a friend (it’s sort of big, so ask first).
2. Send them a link to w w w.ideavirus.com so they can download it themselves.
3. Visit w w w.fastcompany.com/ideaviru s to read the Fast Company article.
4. Buy a copy of the hardcover book at
www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/09703... .
5. Print out as many copies as you like.

3 stars and lots to think about

Some of the references might be dated. What’s the concepts are still has roll Aventis ever.

Marketing ideas and unleashing those ideas is still one of the most elusive goals in business.

Seth Godin’s ability to make you think (maybe even too much) is what makes his books worth coming back to even a decade or more later.

original review:
http://www.reemer.com/archives/2005/0...

I don't remember why I picked this up, but I'm glad I did. Godin is a marketer (with a good blog) who believes that marketing via interruptions (read: TV commercials) is far less effective than marketing through contagious ideas.

He calls these ideas "ideaviruses", and writes that the best way to spread them is to find the group of people that want to be marketed to, identify the most influential people in that group, and to incent and make it easy for those influencers to spread your message.

The best way for an ideavirus to spread is to build it into the product from day one, and, of course, to ensure that your product is worth talking about.

There is some good stuff here, especially if you build or market products and don't have a big brand to help your products become adopted.