Ken Auletta Quotations

Without vision, even the most focused passion is a battery without a device.

If the Ivy League was the breeding ground for the elites of the American Century, Stanford is the farm system for Silicon Valley.

Stanford University is so startlingly paradisial, so fragrant and sunny, it's as if you could eat from the trees and live happily forever.

Perhaps the biggest problem in journalism is the cult divide between journalists and corporate owners.

Always point your finger at the chest of the person with whom you are being photographed. You will appear dynamic. And no photo editor can crop you from the picture.

Among the enduring truths I keep bumping into when there is the luxury of time to get to know people or institutions, is that their decisions are often made for what are not, strictly speaking, reasons of logic.

An important reason Google is usually listed among the world's most trusted brands is that it conveys a sense that the user comes first.

The digital revolution has disrupted most traditional media: newspapers, magazines, books, record companies, radio.

Poorer people tend to watch more television because they can't afford other diversions.

Let's concede that most journalistic enterprises need to make a profit, and to do that, they must be like supermarkets, offering a range of choices to their customers - international news, weather, sports, business, gossip, movie reviews and results of planning board meetings. But too often, journalistic supermarkets have become specialty stores,

Historically, viewers tire of people they have seen on TV for a long period of time.

Journalists prize independence, not teamwork. Journalists understand waste is inherent to good journalism ... that good reporting and writing is hard to quantify.

Journalists would build in more checks and balances and welcome more independent ombudsmen,

Sure we play rough, they said, but look what others do to us.

The press was doing its job, and in doing its job, they saw this clash between what they were witnessing with their own eyes and what officials were telling them,

We work for the readers - not the shareholders. My friend Peter Jennings, who died last month, and Ted Koppel, your 2000 Red Smith lecturer, served their audience - not their corporate parent. They work their sources, but they do not trim their reporting to please sources. Journalists in television too often chase ratings while print journalists too often chase headlines. However, day in and day out, Jennings, like Koppel, tried to offer citizens information we need to make decisions for our democracy. The best journalists and the best officials are public servants. What flows from this assumption are some pretty startling conclusions.

What did this do to CBS brand credibility? Credibility is really your brand.

We have to find a language to communicate with the folks who sign our checks to help them understand that they will not be able to build a valuable journalistic brand without good journalism, which is expensive. This creates a chasm between us that admittedly will be very hard to bridge ... Our job is not to give the public what they think they want because what they want changes or is wrong. Look at how it changed after 9/11. Before 9/11 the public was less interested, according to every survey, in Islam or international news. After 9/11, they asked, 'How come you didn't tell us more about Islam and what was going on?' What the public wants is more about Brad and Angelina.

I've never tried to be uber-sexy, ... I want to age gracefully. At 48 now, I've finally lost my baby fat. I want to look nice and feel attractive. ... I grew my hair out and got it lightened for the simple reason that I'm pretty gray, and this means I don't have to go to the hairdresser as often.

Now NBC News devotes entire hours to 'exclusive' interviews with the Runaway Bride. CBS' '48 Hours,' which once took us inside the emergency room of a hospital,

This is one of the most gifted interviewers that television or print has ever had, ... Three Blind Mice.

In the end, you have to listen to your customers. Isn't a good business supposed to understand its customers?

Games online and computer games are becoming a huge, huge business, with young males aging 18 to 35.

The importance of humility. We need the humility to know that truth can be ephemeral, that this can be but one version of the truth.

Journalists prize independence - not teamwork.

Passion without focus can lead you astray.

The digital revolution is almost as disruptive to the traditional media business as electricity was to the candle business.

There's a bias on hiring the best engineers wherever they come from. It does seem like a lot of the non-engineering execs come from Ivy League schools, as is true in much of corporate America and government.

I think the press, which arguably was cowed by the (Bush) administration in the run-up to the war with Iraq, was certainly not cowed in covering the aftermath of Katrina.

Zuckerberg had the good sense to know both his own limitations and interests. He wanted an executive who would free him to do what he loved: code, and enhancing the Facebook platform.

The entertainment industry as a whole has given more thought to the pollution of rivers than it has to the pollution of minds.

There are those who believe a liberal or a conservative bias permeates the media. I don't. The operative press bias is one that favors conflict, not ideology, and it is lashed by a market-driven bias to boost ratings or circulation with more wow stories, more sizzle.

Objective is the wrong word. Rather, it's fairness. Objectivity is a false God. Instead we should strive for fairness and transparency.

This is a guy who has an amazing track record over a long period of time. He's not a one-shot wonder. If you can get Jobs on your team, and then make sure he has a stake in the company succeeding, that's a desirable thing.