"Early this year, market researchers headed into playgrounds, skate parks and video arcades throughout Chicago looking for what they called alpha pups. They went up to boys between the ages of 8 and 13 with a question: 'Who's the coolest kid you know?' When they got a name, they would look for that kid and put the question to him. The goal was to ascend the hierarchy of coolness, asking the question again and again until someone finally answered 'Me.'"
—John Tierney, "Here Come the Alpha Pups," The New York Times, August 5, 2001