WHAT MAKES THE BEST

The dynamics that make an object (car, cell-phone, iPod) the must-have, real thing, are comlex. It's more than functionality, popularity, or beauty. Recently a few authors have been exploring this dyanmic, maybe it will be called "The Tipping Point 2.0".
One author is Owen Edwards, and he has just written a book that gives the phenomenon a different name: Quintessence.

"This is a book about things,things that offer more to us than we specifically ask of them and to which we respond more strongly than is easily explained."

Michael Beruit of the Design Observer also writes about this phenomenon (and this book) on his blog.
While David Galbraith writes about the letdown he experienced once he realized the Zune was not the "best".