Jeff Bezos

A life of stasis would be population control, combined with energy rationing. That is the stasis world that you live in if you stay. And even with improvements in efficiency, you'll still have to ration energy. That, to me, doesn't sound like a very exciting civilization for our grandchildren's grandchildren to live in.

The solar system can support a trillion humans. And then we'd have a thousand Mozarts and a thousand Einsteins.

No matter what your mission is, have some notion in your head. Forget the model, whether it's government or nonprofit or profit. Ask yourself the more important question: Is my mission improving the world? Are you sure about it? Seek to disconfirm that all the time. And if you can, change your mission.

What's dangerous is not to evolve.

What consumerism really is, at its worst is getting people to buy things that don't actually improve their lives.

Cleverness is a gift, kindness is a choice.

Everything you are comes from your choices.

When you receive criticism from well-meaning people, it pays to ask, ‘Are they right?’ And if they are, you need to adapt what they’re doing. If they’re not right, if you really have conviction that they’re not right, you need to have that long-term willingness to be misunderstood. It’s a key part of invention.

We watch our competitors, learn from them, see the things that they were doing for customers and copy those things as much as we can.

If you're long-term oriented, customer interests and shareholder interests are aligned.

We innovate by starting with the customer and working backwards. That becomes the touchstone for how we invent.

Invention is by its very nature disruptive. If you want to be understood at all times, then don't do anything new.

Your brand is formed primarily, not by what your company says about itself, but what the company does.

What we want to be is something completely new. There is no physical analog for what Amazon.com is becoming.

If we think long term, we can accomplish things that we couldn't otherwise accomplish.

I’d rather interview 50 people and not hire anyone than hire the wrong person.

If you want to be inventive, you have to be willing to fail.

A lot of people – and I’m just not one of them – believe that you should live for the now. I think what you do is think about the great expanse of time ahead of you and try to make sure that you’re planning for that in a way that’s going to leave you ultimately satisfied. This is the way it works for me.

Focusing on the customer makes a company more resilient.

Advertising is the price you pay for unremakable thinking.

If you're truly obsessed over customers, it'll cover a lot of errors.