Kevin Kelly Quotes

Animals are robots that work. Toons are simply robots without hard bodies.

Aim to be effective, but unpredictable. That is, you want to act in a way that AIs have trouble modeling or imitating. Being unpredictable makes you irreplaceable.

A vacation + a disaster = an adventure.

Bad things can happen fast, but almost all good things happen slowly.

Reading to your children regularly is the best school they will ever get.

In fact, “I have a rule for X” is the only excuse you need for your own personal policies.

We don’t need to be blind to this continuous process. The rate of change in recent times has been unprecedented, which caught us off guard. But now we know: We are, and will remain, perpetual newbies. We need to believe in improbable things more often. Everything is in flux, and the new forms will be an uncomfortable remix of the old. With effort and imagination we can learn to discern what’s ahead more clearly, without blinders.

"One thing you should not fear is competition. They only help to raise your game and build a better product. If they are better than you, you deserve to lose." Peldi in Do! the pursuit of xceptional execution

If your sense of responsibility is not expanding as you grow, you are not really growing.

When negotiating, don’t aim for a bigger piece of the pie; aim to create a bigger pie.

Seeing our world through technology’s eyes has, for me, illuminated its larger purpose. And recognizing what it wants has reduced much of my own conflict in deciding where to place myself in its embrace. This book is my report on what technology wants. My hope is that it will help others find their own way to optimize technology’s blessings and minimize its costs.

Assume no one remembers names. As a courtesy, reintroduce yourself by name even to those you have previously met: “Hi, I’m Kevin.”

As the old joke goes: “Software, free. User manual, $10,000.” But it’s no joke. A couple of high-profile companies, like Red Hat, Apache, and others make their living selling instruction and paid support for free software. The copy of code, being mere bits, is free. The lines of free code become valuable to you only through support and guidance. A lot of medical and genetic information will go this route in the coming decades. Right now getting a full copy of all your DNA is

Aim to die broke. Give to your beneficiaries before you die;
it’s more fun and useful to them. Spend it all. Your last check should go to the funeral
home and it should bounce.

"There is no "I" for a person, for a beehive, for a corporation, for an animal, for a nation, for any living thing. The "I" of a vivisystem is a ghost, an ephemeral shroud."