Wisdom in fragments

Social media has been a wonderful thing; it allows celebrities to bypass the middle-man. Many celebrities have also been able to monetise their social-media and make extra money, often very serious amounts. Crucially, social media gives celebrities the opportunities to speak for themselves and set the record straight.

Celebrity gossip blogger and media personality known for celebrity news website

The world of celebrity offers an escape from the real world, and offers different things to different people. To many, the celebrity world is aspirational, they imagine themselves living that lifestyle and dream of how it would be to go to that premiere, have that fancy house, or that expensive vacation. For others, the world of celebrity is like watching a car-wreck.

Celebrity gossip blogger and media personality known for celebrity news website

What Silicon Valley needs right now is some realism. It needs people who are watching-out and identifying what's real and what's myth. There's a lot of genius and brilliance here, but also a lot of salesmanship.

Editor-in-Chief of Wired Magazine & Cybersecurity Expert

Capital has poured into San Francisco and the Bay Area but the growth hasn't distributed itself beyond the top percentile of the community. If you are in one of these companies, you may have a stable and survivable life in the Bay Area, but if you're not? You're going to have to make some incredible trade-offs.

In Silicon Valley there's a sense that there are 30 individuals who are 10x more capable than most people, it's like a power law scaling of talent... founders get immense leeway, capital rushes toward them... it also creates biases and situations where founders have more power than they should in their company.

Editor-in-Chief of Wired Magazine & Cybersecurity Expert

People think these founders are all brilliant and can't make mistakes, we've found that; there's a sense that they can fix everything or have the answers for everything… they don't, and they can't.

Tech Journalist & Co-Founder of Recode Media

We have to constantly evolve how we make an impact, and make sure that we're doing what the communities we work in want us to support rather than enforcing some kind of model. Our work has to be led by the leaders of communities telling us what will work.

British Film Director & Screenwriter of Romantic Comedies

The moment you send Billy Connolly, Lenny Henry and Victoria Wood out somewhere to make an appeal – they are representatives of 'normal people' perhaps in some ways more than pop stars.... Comedians are a kind of humdrum kind of celebrity, and as such I think they're very good at evoking empathy.

British Film Director & Screenwriter of Romantic Comedies

I flew home with this profound sense of the simultaneity of human suffering; I've never been able to get over that sense that even as I'm talking to you right now, there are people who are living unbearable lives.

British Film Director & Screenwriter of Romantic Comedies

It's always been the job of comedy to point out hypocrisies and problems – it's a long historical tradition that goes all the way back to Aristotle and Jonathan Swift.

British Film Director & Screenwriter of Romantic Comedies

He was playing it and people were dancing. They didn't need to know who the band was, they didn't know what Nile Rodgers… didn't mean anything. They were just going crazy.

Legendary Guitarist & Producer: Chic Founder, Producer for David Bowie, Madonna

I walked into a club that I didn't even know had my record – thought it was a demo – the engineer who recorded it also happened to be a DJ, he'd been playing it for 2 weeks and it'd become the biggest song in the club, this unknown group called Chick or Cheek or whatever, he didn't even know what to call it.

Legendary Guitarist & Producer: Chic Founder, Producer for David Bowie, Madonna

I was talking to some kids last night and they were asking me 'do you remember that first moment that you knew you'd made it', and I said, 'of course I remember that moment, I'd been chasing it all my life'.

Legendary Guitarist & Producer: Chic Founder, Producer for David Bowie, Madonna

When you don't know your self-worth, you're more docile and easier to control by the 'machine.' That's the cult-like structure society is built around.

Actress & #MeToo activist who exposed Harvey Weinstein harassment

We are all creative beings, but we're brought up being told not to colour outside the lines – but why? It's OK to be different…. It's more than OK to be different, and we need to encourage that.

Actress & #MeToo activist who exposed Harvey Weinstein harassment

The key component of bravery is integrity. What I saw growing up was the reality that people would often give their integrity to make life more comfortable in the short term; but guess what, that leads to your integrity being chipped away until you are left with nothing.

Actress & #MeToo activist who exposed Harvey Weinstein harassment