When I was growing up, I was as socially outcast as any nerd could possibly be. I was in the chess club, I brought D&D stuff to school, I had every game system you could imagine, I spent countless hours at arcades, computer camp, loud presence in the Latin Club. All that stuff.

Do you think Patrick Swayze now goes up behind people in pottery classes and hugs them just to crack up other ghosts?

We are in niche consumption mode, but 'niche' doesn't mean 'small' anymore. Niche can mean focused, and particularly with the Web, which is a global audience you can have something niche and still get 10 to 15 million views.

Nerds get caught up in minutiae, because there is a tremendous and fulfilling sense of control in understanding every single detail of a thing more than any other living creature.

If you're able to build from your falls you'll be unstoppable and damn near fearless. You see, every time you fall down and get back up, you add another piece of body armor to yourself. You learn what not to do, how to do better, and how to create comfort through practice.

The nerds provide the toys that distract the morons. So the nerds are sort of the new drug-dealers. We're the drug dealers of the 21st century because we provide all the brain candy for the mouth-breathers, for lack of a better word.

I had a personal blog, but why does anyone care that I went shopping for hats?