California has a special relationship with the Internet. Many of the core technologies that power the Internet were invented here. Many of the most successful online entrepreneurs and content creators – in business, the arts, and countless other endeavors – got their start here.

I mean, we’ve built a lot of products that we think are good, and will help people share photos and share videos and write messages to each other. But it’s really all about how people are spreading Facebook around the world in all these different countries. And that’s what’s so amazing about the scale that it’s at today.

You must capture and keep the heart of the original and supremely able man before his brain can do its best.

These days, children can text on their cell phone all night long, and no one else is seeing that phone. You don’t know who is calling that child.

Entrepreneurs and their small enterprises are responsible for almost all the economic growth in the United States.

Part of the secret of a success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside.

The principle of all successful effort is to try to do not what is absolutely the best, but what is easily within our power, and suited for our temperament and condition.

If you want to be successful, it’s just this simple. Know what you are doing. Love what you are doing. And believe in what you are doing.

The absolute transformation of everything that we ever thought about music will take place within 10 years, and nothing is going to be able to stop it. I see absolutely no point in pretending that it’s not going to happen. I’m fully confident that copyright, for instance, will no longer exist in 10 years.

Success is neither magical nor mysterious. Success is the natural consequence of consistently applying the basic fundamentals.

Before I do anything, I think, well what hasn’t been seen. Sometimes, that turns out to be something ghastly and not fit for society. And sometimes that inspiration becomes something that’s really worthwhile.

Basically, I’m one of the greatest producers ever. And I’m also one of the greatest DJs ever. And I’m also one of the best executives ever.

I think that once you’ve had a few No. 1s in your career that you’ve kind of proven yourself, and I don’t feel the need to prove anything anymore.

Often people become our friend or follower with an undercurrent of resentment in our having more success than they have. They secretly desire the opportunity to take us down a notch; they have a nose for any misstep on our part they can exploit.

He has achieved success who has worked well, laughed often, and loved much.

We will naturally pursue our goals on the strength of our own resources, skills and enterprise. But, we know that we will be more successful when we do this in partnership with the world.

Name the greatest of all inventors. Accident.

One of the most important things you learn from the Internet is that there is no ‚them‘ out there. It’s just an awful lot of ‚us.‘

FaceTime helps me a lot. I feel like I’m at home even though I’m not.

Even more amazing than modern technology is our opportunity to access information directly from Heaven, without hardware, software, or monthly service fees.

Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door.

If you want to succeed you should strike out on new paths, rather than travel the worn paths of accepted success.

That nice, soft pillow and the warm blanket, and it’s all comfortable, and no one wants to leave that comfort – but if you can wake up early in the morning, get a head start on everyone else that’s still sleeping, get productive time doing things that you need to do – that’s a huge piece to moving your life forward.

The arts don’t exist in isolation.

If you don’t understand the details of your business you are going to fail.

It took us three years to build the NeXT computer. If we’d given customers what they said they wanted, we’d have built a computer they’d have been happy with a year after we spoke to them – not something they’d want now.

It’s a fact that more people watch television and get their information that way than read books. I find new technology and new ways of communication very exciting and would like to do more in this field.

The future of advertising is the Internet.

Connectivity is a human right.

Software constraints are only confining if you use them for what they’re intended to be used for.

We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.

If you’re afraid to fail, then you’re probably going to fail.

If you want to thrive in today’s economy, you must challenge the status quo and get the financial education necessary to succeed.

Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground.

I think it’s brought the world a lot closer together, and will continue to do that. There are downsides to everything; there are unintended consequences to everything. The most corrosive piece of technology that I’ve ever seen is called television – but then, again, television, at its best, is magnificent.

Of course, I do everything for money.

We’re already cyborgs. Your phone and your computer are extensions of you, but the interface is through finger movements or speech, which are very slow.

Of all the inventions of humans, the computer is going to rank near or at the top as history unfolds and we look back. It is the most awesome tool that we have ever invented. I feel incredibly lucky to be at exactly the right place in Silicon Valley, at exactly the right time, historically, where this invention has taken form.

I think if I keep working in the way that I am, from the heart and from passion and with love, well, the fruits of that will keep coming.

This whole phenomenon of the computer in a library is an amazing thing.

Until you have learned to be tolerant with those who do not always agree with you, you will be neither successful nor happy.

The man who does more than he is paid for will soon be paid for more than he does.

I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance. It overcomes almost everything, even nature.

Action may not always bring happiness; but there is no happiness without action.

I think there will be PCs at every price point.

There’s no real excuse for being successful enough as an actor to do what you want and then selling out. You do it pure. You don’t try to adapt it, make it commercial.

You can’t be afraid to fail. It’s the only way you succeed – you’re not gonna succeed all the time, and I know that.

Why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me.

It has been my observation that most people get ahead during the time that others waste.

The highest reward for a person’s toil is not what they get for it, but what they become by it.

I think California has the best energy.

On the Internet, you think everything is going to be public.

I didn’t know how to deal with success. If there was a Rock Star 101, I would have liked to take it. It might have helped me.

Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.

If you believe in what you are doing, then let nothing hold you up in your work. Much of the best work of the world has been done against seeming impossibilities. The thing is to get the work done.

SpaceX is only 12 years old now. Between now and 2040, the company’s lifespan will have tripled. If we have linear improvement in technology, as opposed to logarithmic, then we should have a significant base on Mars, perhaps with thousands or tens of thousands of people.

Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither.

Kites rise highest against the wind – not with it.

Necessity is the mother of taking chances.

You want to know whether we’re better off? I’ve got a little bumper sticker for you: Osama bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive. Osama bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive! Osama bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive!

It is true that SpaceX is partially a government contractor, but it would be unfair to say that SpaceX is entirely a government contractor.