Robert Fairthorne and the empirical power laws.

Purpose - Aims to review Fairthorne's classic article "Empirical hyperbolic distributions (Bradford-Zipf-Mandelbrot) for bibliometric description and prediction" (Journal of Documentation, Vol. 25, pp. 319-343,1969), as part of a series marking the Journal of Documentation's 60th anniversary. Design/methodology/approach - Analysis of article content, qualitative evaluation of its subsequent impact, citation analysis, and diffusion analysis. Findings - The content, further developments and influence on the field of informetrics of this landmark paper are explained. Originality/value - A review is given of the contents of Fairthorne's original article and its influence on the field of informetrics. Its transdisciplinary reception is measured through a diffusion analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]