The single most important thing a city can do is provide a community where interesting, smart people want to live with their families.

Acquaintances represent a source of social power, and the more acquaintances you have the more powerful you are.

It is those who are successful, in other words, who are most likely to be given the kinds of special opportunities that lead to further success. It’s the rich who get the biggest tax breaks. It’s the best students who get the best teaching and most attention. And it’s the biggest nine- and ten-year-olds who get the most coaching and practice. Success is the result of what sociologists like to call “accumulative advantage.

Whenever we have something that we are good at--something we care about--that experience and passion fundamentally change the nature of our first impressions.

if we can control the environment in which rapid cognition takes place, then we can control rapid cognition

The great accomplishment of Jobs's life is how effectively he put his idiosyncrasies - his petulance, his narcissism, and his rudeness - in the service of perfection.

I don't like things that aren't true.