I really chess-play culture shifts. I'm really good at understanding what worldwide cell-phone use means. That's what I do. I try to picture it three to four to five steps ahead.

People are more comfortable learning about wine because now they can just Google, you know, 'Soave,' and say, 'Oh, O.K., cool.'

I always say that the real success of Wine Library wasn't due to the videos I posted, but to the hours I spent talking to people online afterward, making connections and building relationships.

Think of social media as the Internet. I can't think of anyone betting against the Internet in 2012.

I've become obsessed with preserving Shaker furniture. I feel as though every influence in my life, everything I've learned and know, all the money I've made, has come together to take care of it.

If you are working in a publicly subsidized building, then you have a responsibility to deliver truly interesting, risky, innovative, even provocative work. Work that speaks to your audience in many resonant ways. The priority is less about the financial rewards.

Israel should share its great wealth with its neighbors, like the Palestinians, in areas like governance and investment as well as the building of institutions.

We've gotten to a point where it costs so much money to make a movie that directors and filmmakers feel they have to make sure that everybody gets it. And that's an unfortunate development, I think, in a lot of narratives floating around in the film industry.