Is the Long Tail Argument Just Plain Wrong?

"Now, just in time for The Long Tail's paperback release, the book has fallen under critical scrutiny. Anita Elberse, a marketing professor at the Harvard Business School, recently examined several years' worth of American movie- and music-sales data. The entertainment business has indeed seen its inventory shifting toward a Long Tail curve, Elberse writes in the Harvard Business Review. The shift is slight, however, and Anderson's Long Tail is also "extremely flat."(Farhad Manjoo, Slate)

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