Gameable Quotes & Sayings

In winter we lead a more inward life. Our hearts are warm and cheery, like cottages under drifts ... — Henry David Thoreau

It is certain that most who concentrate upon achievement miss life. — Michael Joseph Oakeshott

Some of my best thinking is done by others. — John C. Maxwell

Israel cannot afford to stand against the entire world and be denounced as the aggressor. — Moshe Dayan

It's just that fun atmosphere, working on the car, being with the guys. This is exactly what I needed. — Kurt Busch

I remember when I was probably about ten years old I had a pen pal, and writing letters back and forth with him was one of my favorite things to do. His name was Steve and he lived in one of those huge mansions that's so big it has a name. It was called the Louisiana State Penitentiary, and he told me it was even bigger than the mayor's mansion. We'd send letters back and forth and he'd ask me to send him my favorite books and small pieces of metal or wood that were lying around and all the money I could find in my house. And I'd gather them all up and put cute little stickers of cats on the packages and send them away. It was so fun. Eventually we stopped writing because I moved to another city and he moved out to live on his own. He called it "solitary confinement." I was always so impressed by his vocabulary. — Ellen DeGeneres

Government subsidies can be critically analyzed according to a simple principle: You are smarter than the government, so when the government pays you to do something you wouldn't do on your own, it is almost always paying you to do something stupid. — P. J. O'Rourke

In Iraq, the U.S. military's whack-a-mole approach to killing Saddam Hussein may have finally paid off. The bombs destroyed the area and left behind a 60-foot crater, or as coalition forces prefer to call it: a freedom hole. — Jon Stewart

If a slave is unwilling to go with his new master, he is whipped, or locked up in jail, until he consents to go, and promises not to run away during the year. — Harriet Ann Jacobs

Horror fiction allows us to confront and sublimate our fears of an uncontrollable universe, but the threat verges on the overwhelming and may indeed carry the protagonists away. Spy fiction in contrast allows us to believe for a while that the little people can, by obtaining secret knowledge, acquire some leverage over the overwhelming threats that permeate their universe. — Charles Stross

Klout and various measurements of influence are fun. I love to see where I score on them, but there's a computer algorithm behind the calculation. If there's an algorithm, it can be gamed. Even if it's not gameable, you have to take a leap of faith that the number of followers, retweets, mentions, whatever really mean something. — Guy Kawasaki