Tech talk: notable and quotable words of 2013

26 Dec 2013

Just as cool or interesting as the latest gadgets, companies and tech trends are the people behind them, and what they have said. Here’s a look back at some of the most notable quotes by big names in technology this past year.

“Being called a traitor by Dick Cheney is the highest honour you can give an American.”
– former CIA contractor and whistleblower Edward Snowden in June, in response to former US vice-president Dick Cheney referring to him as a traitor

“Technology has evolved so much in the last 10 years that the next generation just thinks being next to each other on video wherever you are is simply the way life works.”
– Elisa Steele, chief marketing officer for Skype at Microsoft, on the 10th anniversary in August of the instant-messaging and voice-over-IP service

“The internet is transforming almost every element of the news business: shortening news cycles, eroding long-reliable revenue sources, and enabling new kinds of competition, some of which bear little or no news-gathering costs. There is no map, and charting a path ahead will not be easy.”
– Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.com, upon his acquiring The Washington Post in August for US$250m

“The Dell board, like so many boards in this country, reminds me of Clark Gable’s last words in Gone with the Wind, they simply ‘don’t give a damn’.”
– Carl Icahn, US investor, in a letter to Dell shareholders in September, after he dropped his attempt to take over the company

“The iPhone 5c is beautifully, unapologetically plastic.”
– Sir Jony Ive, senior vice-president of design at Apple, when the iPhone 5c was revealed in September

“I’m just geeky and shy and I like to code.”
– Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo!, in an interview in Vogue magazine’s September issue

“What the f*ck happened here?”
– Michael Arrington, founder and former co-editor of TechCrunch, questioning Marissa Mayer, CEO of Yahoo!, at TechCrunch Disrupt SF in September on Yahoo!’s redesigned logo

“I’ve had the time of my life!”
– Steve Ballmer, outgoing CEO of Microsoft, in a goodbye speech to employees in September

“If you think it is slowing down then you ain’t seen nothing yet.”
– Stephen Prentice, VP, Gartner Research and Gartner fellow, speaking in November about the amount of data individuals and organisations generate

“A lot of people think of this (an IPO) as a goal you have to get to but it’s a milestone. If you think about it as a goal, you’re rushing towards it and then stop, and that’s not the way to build a timeless company.”
– Jack Dorsey, co-founder of Twitter. Twitter went public in November on the New York Stock Exchange

Megaphone user image via Shutterstock

Tina Costanza was a journalist and sub-editor at Silicon Republic

editorial@siliconrepublic.com