Pinball games were constrained by physical limitations, ultimately by the physical laws that govern the motion of a small metal ball. The video world knows no such bounds. Objects fly, spin, accelerate, change shape and color, disappear and reappear. Their behavior, like the behavior of anything created by a computer program, is limited only by the programmer's imagination. The objects in a video game are representations of objects. And a representation of a ball, unlike a real one, never need obey the laws of gravity unless its programmer wants it to.

We all really need to listen to each other, including to the boring bits.

We're letting [technology] take us places that we don't want to go.

These days, insecure in our relationships and anxious about intimacy, we look to technology for ways to be in relationships and protect ourselves from them at the same time.

We expect more from technology and less from each other. We create technology to provide the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship.

The computer is a mind machine. It doesn't have its own psychology, but in a way it presents itself as though it does.

Someday, someday, but certainly not now, I'd like to learn how to have a conversation.