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Nicholas Negroponte

Nicholas Negroponte Quotes

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Nicholas Negroponte is an American author, scholar, and entrepreneur renowned for his contributions to the fields of information technology and media. Born on December 1, 1943, he is a co-founder of the MIT Media Lab and the founder of the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) project.

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Famous Nicholas Negroponte Quotes

“Young people, I happen to believe, are the world's most precious natural resource.”

People World Believe Happens Young Natural Resources Natural Resources

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“You can see the future best through peripheral vision.”

Vision Peripheral Vision

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“We have to make machines understand what they're doing, or they won't be able to come back and say, 'Why did you do that?”

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“MIT is governed by a second, even higher rule: the inalienable right of academic freedom.”

Higher Academic Mit Academic Freedom

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“I've spent my whole life worrying about the human-computer interface, so I don't want to suggest that what we have today is even close to acceptable.”

Want Humans Whole Today Worry Computer Whole Life Acceptable Interfaces

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Digital living will include less and less dependence upon being in a specific place at a specific time, and the transmission of place itself will start to become possible.”

Digital Dependence Transmission

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Good education has got to be good entertainment.”

Entertainment Be Good Good Education

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Computing is not about computers any more. It is about living. Whatever big problem you can imagine, from world peace to the environment to hunger to poverty, the solution always includes education, ... We need to depend more on peer-to-peer and self-driven learning. The laptop is one important means of doing that.”

World Needs Mean Important Self Problem Bigs Poverty Environment Imagine Depends Computer Solutions Hunger Driven Peers Big Problems Laptops Computing

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Remember that the military used wind-up radios for years.”

Years Remember Used Military Wind Radio

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Where do new ideas come from? The answer is simple: differences. While there are many theories of creativity, the only tenet they all share is that creativity comes from unlikely juxtapositions. The best way to maximize differences is to mix ages, cultures, and disciplines.”

Way Ideas Age Culture Differences Simple Answers Creativity Share Theory Discipline Best Way New Ideas Unlikely Mixing Juxtaposition Maximizing Ideation

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“One of the basics of a good system of innovation is diversity. In some ways, the stronger the culture (national, institutional, generational, or other), the less likely it is to harbor innovative thinking. Common and deep-seated beliefs, widespread norms, and behavior and performance standards are enemies of new ideas. Any society that prides itself on being harmonious and homogeneous is very unlikely to catalyze idiosyncratic thinking. Suppression of innovation need not be overt. It can be simply a matter of peoples walking around in tacit agreement and full comfort with the status quo.”

“Programming allows you to think about thinking, and while debugging you learn learning.”

Thinking Programming Debugging

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“A Wired reader told me once, Get a life, which I read from the back of a yacht in the Aegean, while eating fresh sea urchins and drinking terrific Montrachet.”

Sea Design Reader Eating Drinking Software Terrific Yacht Software Design

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“By the year 2020 the largest employer in the developed world will be the self.”

World Years Self Employers

Book:Being Digital

Source: Being Digital

“This is just the beginning, the beginning of understanding that cyberspace has no limits, no boundaries.”

Understanding Limits Boundaries No Boundaries Cyberspace

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Learning by doing, peer-to-peer teaching, and computer simulation are all part of the same equation.”

Teaching Computer Peers Equations Simulation Learning By Doing

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“My advice to graduates is to do anything except what you are trained for. Take that training to a place where it is out of place and stimulate ideas, shake up establishments, and don't take no for an answer.”

Ideas Answers Advice Training Shakes Establishment Graduates

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“My goal is not selling laptops. OLPC is not in the laptop business. It's in the education business.”

Goal Selling Laptops

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Access by kids to the Internet should be like kids breathing clean air.”

Should Kids Air Internet Clean Access Breathing Clean Air

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“I'm not good at selling laptops. I'm good at selling ideas.”

Ideas Selling Laptops

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Linux is its own worst enemy: it's splintered, it has different distributions, it's too complex to run for most people.”

People Different Running Enemy Worst Complexes Distribution Worst Enemy Linux

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“The laptop brings back a more seamless kind of learning.”

Kind Laptops Seamless

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Big companies are looking closer term, and even the most technological companies spend less than 1% of sales on research. Startups have suffered the burst bubble.”

Bigs Term Company Research Bubbles Technological Big Companies

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Giving the kids a programming environment of any sort, whether it's a tool like Squeak or Scratch or Logo to write programs in a childish way - and I mean that in the most generous sense of the word, that is, playing with and building things - is one of the best ways to learn.”

Way Giving Writing Mean Kids Environment Building Program Tools Best Way Generous Programming Scratches Logos Building Things

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“It's hard to propose a $100 laptop for a world community of kids and then not say in the same breath that you're going to depend on the community to make software for it.”

World Hard Kids Community Depends Breaths Software Propose Laptops

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

“Nature is pretty good at networks, self-organizing systems. By contrast, social systems are top-down and hierarchical, from which we draw the basic assumption that organization and order can only come from centralism.”

Self Order Social Draws Organization Down And Assumption Contrast Social Systems Top Down

Author:Nicholas Negroponte

About the Author

Born: December 1, 1943
Known for: Author
Quotes: 76

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