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Next level down the pyraoal is to be the second person in the world to catch the latest disease They watch carefully for innovations, always ready to jump on board But more importantly, other people watch them Unlike the Innovators, they are cool, so when they pick up an innovation, it becoatekeeper, the filter that separates out real Innovators froh I&039;ve heard that in the 1980s, there were sos No comment)

Below them are the Early Adopters

Adopters always have the latest phone, the latest uys who download the trailer a year before the row older, Early Adopters&039; closets fill up with dinosaur ht-track tapes) They test and tweak the trend, softening the edges And one vital difference froazine first, not on the street

Further doe have the Consumers The people who have to see a product on TV, placed in two iant rack in the , "Hey, that&039;s pretty cool"

At which point it&039;s not

Last are the Laggards I kind of like them Proud in their e, or at least all change since they got out of high school And once every ten years they suffer the uncomfortable realization that their brown leather jackets with big lapels have become, briefly, cool

But they bravely tuck in their Kiss T-shirts and soldier on

The unspoken rule was that Mandy&039;s s were for Trendsetters Or at least people who had been Trendsetters before Mandy hired the trendy, who knohat you are?

A cool hunter? Market researcher? Scaot fifty bucks for her opinion or not She was an Innovator And, as I should have expected, she had coht

"Did I get you in trouble?" she asked on the street

"Nah," I said (Nah is Hunter-speak for yes)

"Come on Mandy was about to spit her pacifier"

I sot um-spotted street "That always happens"

"What always happens?"

"I say the wrong thing" Sadness had settled into Jen&039;s voice, which I couldn&039;t allow

I took a rant-sized breath "Youout with so with each other - about the new reat, or the band they all love, or whatever is most recently super-cool - you find yourself uncontrollably saying that it&039;s actually crap? 0ust because it is) And suddenly they&039;re all staring at you?"

Jen stopped right in front of the NBA store, openos I squinted in the glare

"I guess so, yeah," she said "I mean, exactly"

I smiled I&039;d known a few Innovators inin the world to be "And so your friends don&039;t knohat to do with you So you shut up about it, right?"

"Well, that&039;s the thing" She turned, and we kept walking don through the post-work crowd "I never really got the shut-up-about-it part"

"Good for you"

"Which is how I got you in trouble, Hunter"

"So what? It&039;s not like they can fix the ad with a re-edit And it&039;s too late to reshoot the whole thing It would be worse if you&039;d said the white guy&039;s tie was too wide Then they&039;d actually have to do so"

"Oh, that makes me feel better"

"Jen, you shouldn&039;t feel bad about this You were the only one up there saying anything interesting We&039;ve all done a hundred of those tastings Maybe we&039;ve gone soft"

"Yeah, andon in that conference room, too"

"There was?" I looked up at the skyscraper still hanging over us, and hborhoods, cool I groups, and constituencies represented at the tasting I slotted each participant into his or her place on the cool Venn diagra -black-woman formation

"I hadn&039;t even noticed"

"Really?"

"Really" I had to smile "That makes it even better that you spoke up Maybe it&039;s not what Mandy wanted to hear, but it&039;s what she needs to hear"

Jen was silent as we took the stairs down into the subway, swiped our cards to make the turnstiles turn

On the platform we faced each other, close in the rush-hour crowd Around us were guys with their jackets over one ared into sneakers with their office attire (I alonder: as the Innovator on that one? Howdown, and I watched her expression shifting, her furrowed brow and green eyes ht that she probably made silly faces at little kids on the subhen their parents weren&039;t watching | and was really good at it

She crinkled her nose in the hot smelly air "But didn&039;t you just say it won&039;t ed "Not for &039;Don&039;t Walk But(Down in the subway! At the risk of product placerrl, said the display

That was fast, I thought

And standing there, pretty sure I was about to get fired, a funny thing happened I foundabout the job, the ry that it was happening right in front of Jen and would est client

"Hi, Mandy"

"Just got off the conference call The ad airs this weekend, no changes"

"Congratulations"

"I told the client about what you and your friend said"

I started to open my mouth to say it hadn&039;t been ood So I sed the words

"They were intrigued," Mandy said flatly

A train went by on the other track, and the conversation took a ten-second pause Jen atching me carefully, still with the bad-smell expression on her face I mimed confusion for her

The train rattled away into its hole

"Intrigued as in pissed off? Intrigued as in hit-ued as in interested, Hunter They were glad to see soet personal I just take pictures"

"I mean it They were interested in what you said"

"Not interested enough to change the ad"

"No, Hunter Not interested enough to reshoot a two- they want your help with, an issue that actually needs soave Jen a puzzled look "What kind of issue?"

"It just popped up last week It&039;s sort of weird, Hunter A big deal You have to see for yourself And you&039;ve got to keep it secret How&039;s toht But it wasn&039;t really me who - "

"Meet me at eleven-thirty in Chinatown, Lispenard and Church, just below Canal"

"Okay"

"And bring your new friend, of course Don&039;t be late"

Mandy disconnected I dropped the phone into ot you fired, didn&039;t I?"

"No, I don&039;t think so" I tried to ime in the Hudson sealed in concrete "No, definitely not"

"What did she say?"

"I think we got pro another s tomorrow?"