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Why do some technological and cultural products spread like kudzu while others wither on the vine? Journalists and academics have written volumes about "stickiness," but even the sharpest manufacturers, publishers, and producers have been rejecting future hits for decades -- often ideas and styles the break normally reasonable rules.  Parker Brothers actually declined Monopoly twice: as the Landlord's Game (a simulation promoting Henry George's socialist tax reform principles, with a cult following in academic economics) in the 1920s, and its ultimate pro-capitalist version, authorized for a pittance by the unworldly original patent holder, in the 1930s. (The developer of that successful revision, or rather inversion, had to market a home-made prototype to convince them.) But if the game had flopped, there would have been many plausible reasons -- too complicated, consumers were sick of monopolies, etc.

Recent tributes to the late composer Vic Mizzy show the power and unpredictability of hits. The LA Times explains how it worked:

. . . [B]ecause the production company, Filmways, refused to pay for singers, Mizzy sang it himself and overdubbed it three times. The song, memorably punctuated by finger-snapping, begins with: "They're creepy and they're kooky, mysterious and spooky, they're altogether ooky: the Addams family."

In the 1996 book "TV's Biggest Hits: The Story of Television Themes From 'Dragnet' to 'Friends,' " author Jon Burlingame writes that Mizzy's "musical conception was so specific that he became deeply involved with the filming of the main-title sequence, which involved all seven actors snapping their fingers in carefully timed rhythm to Mizzy's music."

For Mizzy, who owned the publishing rights to "The Addams Family" theme, it was an easy payday.

"I sat down; I went 'buh-buh-buh-bump [snap-snap], buh-buh-buh-bump," he recalled in a 2008 interview on CBS' "Sunday Morning" show. "That's why I'm living in Bel-Air: Two finger snaps and you live in Bel-Air."

It's encouraging to note that budget limits helped make the song such a success.Mizzy was challenged to become a one-man band and chorus, rose to the task, and managed to include copyright ownership in his contract. Mizzy not only had the right idea, he was willing to put hours of work into the right execution.

For whatever obscure neurological or aesthetic reason, the theme song has joined the ranks of the earworms. It's infectious even across species. Parrots learn not only speech but melodies and rhythm from their human companions, and the Addams Family theme song is an avian hit on Youtube, with dozens of versions by cockatiels alone. Here's the best finger snap I found:


Creative success is usually a lot of work -- except when it isn't. And in the end, like the Mizzy's Adamses, it can also be a bit "mysterious and spooky."

One of the rare financial benefits of going freelance: It slashes your dry cleaning bills. That's what first occurred to me on reading "When No One Wants to Look Like a Banker" in the New York Times Styles section. It explains:

While double-digit declines have hit much of the retail sector, one of the few pieces of good news is one of the most surprising. In a reversal of every recession in the last 100 years, figures show that men have not cut back on buying clothes as much as women have. They're not buying power suits -- they're replacing them.

"I have guys coming in here saying, 'I don't want to look like a banker anymore,' " said Eric Goldstein, an owner of Jean Shop, a premium denim store in the meatpacking district. He is now dispensing advice on how to look like a "creative professional."

Meanwhile in the Business section, the Times reports the continuing troubles of a flagship 122-year-old American men's clothing manufacturer, Hartmarx, makers of a top brand, Hickey-Freeman. Why hasn't the new trend helped them? Whatever the answer, it's refreshing to see a break from months of frugality journalism, and a new creed to replace the restored formality that in turn, not so long ago, ended Casual Fridays. But one question still troubles me. What happens to the age-old principle of dressing for the job you want?

Does the new style mean that all men now desire to be "creative professionals"? Those jobs are not so secure, either. Do employers really want bond traders to look like art directors or vice versa? And are financial people really wise to look creative? Investment bankers' critics on the Left have been charging that they have been too original. These critics want to make banking "dull again." (I'm agnostic on this notion; see my post on the Conservative of Catastrophe.)

Another problem of the new creative look, at least outside the arts and fashion, is that so many of today's most coveted careers may reward the very style scorned so emphatically by the article's sources. Consider political and civil service positions in Washington, now a growth sector again. And contemplate the garb of the top officials, at least the males, in the Times's own photo gallery of the Obama administration. Or read the assessment of the Washington Post's Marc Fisher. Washington remains America's capital of stodge.

An exhibition at the New York Public Library two years ago documented the origins of today's suits in the tailored padding worn under medieval plate armor. The advantage of conservative clothing, protective anonymity, is likely to endure.