They survey a spectrum of organizations - from eBay to AA - to develop their point, which is, namely, that "leaderless" organizations are virtually "unstoppable" because their lifeblood and DNA is spread out across many independent cells, like a starfish, instead of being concentrated in a central location, like a spider.You can squash a spider and really mess up his day, but when you cut apart a starfish, the plot backfires: each piece turns itself into a whole new organism.
As my friend intimated when he gave me the book, I believe there are useful spiritual truths here; more perhaps than even the authors themselves realize. Though unbelievers, they have been speaking about this concept at house church conferences, fulfilling Luke 16:8 and articulating something that the Church has become terribly confused about.
Some of the examples used in the book seem questionable, and certain activities that are technically criminal, (such as pirating music or vandalizing laboratories,) are presented as positive and inevitable.
The authors operate from that fuzzy but fantasized premise that depravity has been disproven - or at least outmoded - quoting one of Wikipedia's founders as saying "Wikipedia proves that people are basically good." (Later, a bit less enthusiastically, they quote a PayPal employee who contributes some cynicism and reality - "If you were to tell someone at PayPal that people are basically good, they'd laugh in your face" - even the parade must detour around the crime scene.)
However, if you can put up with the drive-thru-esque tone, there is certainly some insight here, presented in an unconventional way. This sort of book is not written for those of us who are used to reading carefully, so it pays to adjust your strategy a bit to avoid wasting time looking for depth that isn't there. You have to read things as they are designed to be read: in this case, quickly.
Image courtesy of barnesandnoble.com
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