Kevin Kelly Quotes

Habit is far more dependable than inspiration. Make progress by making habits. Don’t focus on getting into shape. Focus on becoming the kind of person who never misses a workout.

The entire global economy is tipping away from the material and toward intangible bits. It is moving away from ownership and toward access. It is tilting away from the value of copies and toward the value of networks. It is headed for the inevitability of constant, relentless, and increasing remixing. The laws will be slow to follow, but they will follow.

Always read the plaque next to the monument.

Read a lot of history so you can understand how weird the past was; that way you will be comfortable with how weird the future will be.

When you feel like quitting, just do five more: 5 more minutes, 5 more pages, 5 more steps. Then repeat. Sometimes you can break through and keep going, but even if you can’t, you ended five ahead. Tell yourself that you will quit tomorrow, but not today.

Nearly every aspect of modern civilization has been flattening down except one: money. Minting money is one of the last jobs left for a central government that most political parties agree is legitimate. It takes a central bank to battle the perennial scourges of counterfeit and fraud. Someone has to regulate the amount of money issued, keep track of the serial numbers, ensure that the money is trusted. A robust currency requires accuracy, coordination, security, enforcement — and an institution that takes responsibility for all those. Thus behind every currency stands a watchful central bank.

Everyone’s time is finite and shrinking. The highest leverage you can get with your money is to buy someone else’s time. Hire and outsource when you can.

As far back as 1813, Thomas Jefferson understood that ideas were not really property, or if they were property they differed from real estate. He wrote, “He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.” If

You can eat any dessert you want if you take only three bites.

Now imagine these choices pinned on a slider bar. On the left side of the slot is the pair personal/transparent. On the right side is the pair private/generic. The slider can slide to either side or anywhere in between. The slider is an important choice we have. Much to everyone’s surprise, though, when technology gives us a choice (and it is vital that it remain a choice), people tend to push the slider all the way over to the personal/transparent side. They’ll take transparent personalized sharing. No psychologist would have predicted that 20 years ago. If today’s social media has taught us anything about ourselves as a species, it is that the human impulse to share overwhelms the human impulse for privacy. This has surprised the experts. So far, at every juncture that offers a choice, we’ve tilted, on average, toward more sharing, more disclosure, more transparency. I would sum it up like this: Vanity trumps privacy.

We are all steering.

It is usually much easier to make big audacious changes than small incremental ones.

To move through a place you may not be permitted, act like you belong there.

To build strong children, reinforce their sense of belonging to a family by articulating exactly what is distinctive about your family. They should be able to say with pride, “Our family does X.”

When you are young, have friends who are older; when you are old, have friends who are younger.