Arousal leaves us mind-blind.

When crime drops dramatically in New York for no apparent reason, or when a movie made on a shoestring budget ends up making hundreds of millions of dollars - we're surprised. I'm saying, don't be surprised. This is the way social epidemics work.

A prediction, in a field where prediction is not possible, is no more than a prejudice.

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

The trick to finding ideas is to convince yourself that everyone and everything has a story.

You don't want to be first, right? You want to be second or third. You don't want to be - Facebook is not the first in social media. They're the third, right? Similarly, you know, if you look at Steve Jobs' history, he's never been first.

You don't start at the top if you want to find the story. You start in the middle, because it's the people in the middle who do the actual work in the world.