Secrets are hard but solvable problems and we should talk about them. It's hard to work toward a radically better future if you don't believe in secrets.

The zero-sum world [the movie The Social Network] portrayed has nothing in common with the Silicon Valley I know, but I suspect it's a pretty accurate portrayal of the dysfunctional relationships that dominate Hollywood.

My own answer to the contrarian question is that most people think the future of the world will be defined by globalization, but the truth is that technology matters more.

I'm in favor of free trade, but I think if you had to make a choice between having technological progress versus free trade, you had one or the other, you should always pick technological progress. I think it's an incredibly important variable for creating more prosperity.

The college kids should think hard about what they're doing. If you have a great idea for a company, there's no right time to start it, and it's often better to start it sooner rather than later. I went to Stanford undergrad and Stanford Law School, and if I had to do it over again, I might still do those things, but I wish I had asked the type of questions like, why I was doing it, was it just for the status and prestige, or was it because I was really interested in the substance of it.

Darwinism may be a fine theory in other contexts, but in startups, intelligent design works best.

We might describe our world as having retail sanity, but wholesale madness.