Six Degrees: Urban Myth?

Does the small world phenomenon actually exist? This article shows that Stanley Milgram was wrong is his conclusion of what he believed was a "small world". In his published studies only less than 30% of the letters he sent out actually made it to there respective targets. Milgram's explanation was that maybe some people did not bother passing the letters on. The fallacy in his argument is that the letters did not look like chain letters, rather they were official looking folders with gold seals.

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/index.php?term=20020301-000038&page=1

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/2490255/6.6-degrees-of-separation.html

Apparently some researchers at Microsoft finds the degrees of separation to be closer to 7. This is a better approximation I think especially that it uses actual data sets on a server of all the MSN messenger users.

6.6 degrees of separation is what schools should be teaching! Kevin Bacon is wrong.