Books and the Lindy Effect

Nassim Nicholas Taleb: "If a book has been in print for forty years, I can expect it to be in print for another forty years. But, and that is the main difference, if it survives another decade, then it will be expected to be in print another fifty years. This, simply, as a rule, tells you why things that have been around for a long time are not "aging" like persons, but "aging" in reverse. Every year that passes without extinction doubles the additional life expectancy. This is an indicator of some robustness. The robustness of an item is proportional to its life!"

In other words, if you only have a limited time for reading, then read a book that has been popular for a very long time rather than reading the latest books on the New York Times bestseller list. Jane Eyre has been in print for 170 years, and there is a reason for that and we can expect, according to the Lindy Effect have it around for another 170 years. In other words, read Orwell's 1984 rather than Comey's A Higher Loyalty. Read Atlas Shrugged instead of The President is Missing. Read The Count of Montecristo instead of The Hate U Give.