Product Success Is Not About the Zeitgeist

Star Wars and Harry Potter would have been hits in any era.

by

Cass R. Sunstein

by

Cass R. Sunstein

June 22, 2016

Star Wars has become one of the defining sagas of our time. As of now, it’s earned more than $30 billion. No one predicted that level of success. Most people thought A New Hope, the first Star Wars movie, would flop.

Cass R. Sunstein is the Robert Walmsley University Professor at Harvard and serves as founder and director of the Program on Behavioral Economics and Public Policy at Harvard Law School. From 2009 to 2012, he was the Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, and he has held positions in the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. His books include Decisions About Decisions (Cambridge University Press, 2023) and How to Become Famous (Harvard Business Review Press, 2024). He is also the co-author of Nudge (Yale University Press, 2008; Penguin, 2009, 2021), Noise (William Collins, 2021), and Look Again: The Power of Noticing What Was Always There (Atria, 2024).

Product Success Is Not About the Zeitgeist

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