I have been a big fan of Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner. They are about to release a new book Think Life a Freak on May 18th. Freakonomics and SuperFreakonomics are well known best sellers. They have an amazing ability to tell stories with data.
Telling stories with data has impacted other books that I have chosen to read including Gladwell’s What the Dog Saw, Mark Penn’s Microtrends and Tom Davenport’s Competing on Analytics.
After Freakonomics I was pleased to see Levitt and Dubner make a movie with new stories that focused on the hidden side of everything.
And I found the movie very enjoyable. A few of the stories out of their original book while a new story focused on Chicago, their hometown.
The segment, paying high school students $500 for good grades simply brought out the ‘freak’ side of their research. At the same time I have wondered about how the impact of paying students in middle school may have a bigger impact on success rates.