A top-quartile teacher will increase the performance of their class - based on test scores - by over 10 percent in a single year. ... That means that if the entire U.S., for two years, had top-quartile teachers, the entire difference between us and Asia would go away.

Bitcoin is a technological tour de force

If we [the USA] don't innovate in education, it's literally going to mean less people get to go have that education at a time when more people are going to want it. We've got to put courses out on the Web, we've got to put interactive learning out on the Web.

Really advanced civilization is based on advances in energy.

In fact, batteries haven't improved over the last 100 years as much as they would need to in order to make that happen. So I'm invested in a lot of battery companies - and there's a lot that exists I'm not in. They're all having a tough time achieving it.

With Windows 8, Microsoft is trying to gain market share in what has been dominated by the iPad-type device. But a lot of those users are frustrated. They can't type. They can't create documents.

Climate change is a terrible problem, and it absolutely needs to be solved. It deserves to be a huge priority.