On one project I was hanging out with Brad Pitt, and Ryan Gosling, and Steve Carrel, and Christian Bale, and trying to explain economics to them for a movie I'm an advisor on.

People found it unusual to leave a job where you're the boss.

Writing a column, a weekly column for the New York Times, is really tough, and I wasn't prepared for the demands that that involved.

When you're writing for the New York Times someone reading it knows the topic better than you do and knows when you've messed up.

А weekly column is really tough.

I want to have enough space to, I don't know, think thoughts. I mean, I just - I don't know that I'm capable of having an exciting, profound thought every week that's worth a column.

Slate is not a political magazine but a lot of what it does is politics.

I sound like an evangelist or something.

It's much easier to hire really great people like that in New York and in Brooklyn in particular, than it is in Washington.

I have blocks of time where I'm working intently on something.

What is Atlas Obscura? So, it was a small digital media company. It's an atlas, it's literally like, an atlas of places, wonderful, unusual places.

I want you to be weak. As weak as I am.

That is the artistic task: To choose the best from these solutions.

In my case I don't mind playing a character that irritates people or makes people question my sanity.

Power confuses itself with virtue and tends also to take itself for omnipotence.

I think intelligence is usually sexy until it becomes irritating. After that, you're stuck.

Mr. President, no one is saying you broke any laws, we're just saying it's a little bit weird you didn't have to.

Back in my era, hacking was all about messing with other hackers. It was a hacker war.

A feminist man is a bit like a vegetarian: it's the humanitarian principle he's defending, I suppose.

Enterprise is hard work. You have to integrate the client with the optimized systems of all the servers and software.