Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
When you talk about the oil wealth you compare nations. There are some nations with less than five million people. Nigeria has 150 million people. I cannot say that all the money earned from oil since 1958, when the first drop of oil was exported from this country to date, that the money has been effectively used.
Africa is the second-largest continent, a landmass second from Asia. It also is the second most populated continent, with 900 million people. In fact - coming back to the land mass - Africa is so big that you could fit in the continental United States, China, and the entire Europe into Africa and still have space.
There used to be three networks, and now there are 40 million networks. There's a lot more competition out there, too. We would bring in 27 million people. Now, they're lucky if they have 17. I looked at the ratings, for the first time in 25 years, just to see, and there were 130 shows on. There used to be maybe 30.
When I first got into the major label system, they were like, 'Hey, you're great - now write with a million people so we can get songs.' That was something I hadn't done before, and the songwriters I was working with had worked on some massive numbers - like 'True Colours.' One of the guys wrote 'Livin On A Prayer.'
It's one thing to be writing in South or Latin America, where, except for Brazil, every country, however small and hard to find on a map, speaks Spanish, but quite another to be writing in, say, Hungary, a landlocked nation of 10 million people, with a language that very few people outside Hungary can read or speak.
It's estimated that 16 million people in the U.S. have struggled with depression - and I include myself in that statistic. It's real, and it's not shameful, and there is help available. You can bring it to the light, you can tell the truth, you can go to a meeting, you can reach out to a friend. None of us are alone.
Hyperloop can improve life dramatically for the 16 million people in the greater Moscow area, cutting their commute to a fraction of what it is today. Our longer term vision is to work with Russia to implement a transformative new Silk Road: a cargo Hyperloop that whisks freight containers from China to Europe in a day.
Modern motor vehicles are safer and more reliable than they have ever been - yet more than 1 million people are killed in car accidents around the world each year, and more than 50 million are injured. Why? Largely because one perilous element in the mechanics of driving remains unperfected by progress: the human being.
There are 316 million people in the United States of America. About six million of them watch 'Homeland,' Showtime's thriller about world terror, paranoia, and bipolar disorder. That's about 2 percent of the population; roughly what the guy with the beard running on the Libertarian Party ticket gets when he runs for Congress.
Back, you know, a few generations ago, people didn't have a way to share information and express their opinions efficiently to a lot of people. But now they do. Right now, with social networks and other tools on the Internet, all of these 500 million people have a way to say what they're thinking and have their voice be heard.
But, in North Korea, it's just the opposite. There's one story. It's written by the Kim regime. And 23 million people are conscripted to be secondary characters. There, as a youth, your aptitude towards certain jobs is measured, and the rest of your life is dictated, whether you'll be a fisherman or a farmer or an opera singer.
Between 2001 and 2011, Brazil lifted 20 million people out of poverty and into its growing middle class, and in the last quarter of the twentieth century Botswana's gross domestic product per capita grew faster than that of any other country on the planet. The once-labeled 'Third World' is edging its way into the 'First World.'
One of the most marvelous features of Canton is the city of house boats, floating and stationary, in which about a quarter of a million people live and, it may with truth be added, are born and die. This population is quite distinct in race from the land population of Canton, which looks down upon it as a pariah and alien caste.
The No. 1 quote critics give me is, 'Thom, your work is irrelevant.' Now, that's a fascinating, fascinating comment. Yes, irrelevant to the little subculture, this microculture, of modern art. But here's the point: My art is relevant because it's relevant to 10 million people. That makes me the most relevant artist in this culture.
In the Netherlands - where I come from - you actually never see a pig, which is really strange, because, in a population of 16 million people, we have 12 million pigs. And well, of course, the Dutch can't eat all these pigs. They eat about one-third, and the rest is exported to all kinds of countries in Europe and the rest of the world.
We should have a path to legal status for the 12 million people that are here illegally. It means, come out from the shadows, pay a fine, earn legal status by working, by paying taxes, learning English. Not committing crimes and earn legal status where you're not cutting in front of the line for people that are patiently waiting outside.
For some time, I've said this issue of comprehensive immigration reform is not just an issue about immigration or human rights or civil rights, it's about our economy. You take 11 million people from out of the dark and into the light. The think tanks have surmised that you are talking about trillions of dollars infused into the economy.
I was making projections about 'Humans of New York,' back when I had zero followers, that made all my friends and family roll their eyes. I'd throw out these huge numbers: 'One day, a million people are gonna be looking at this. Trust me.' And even those wild, wild numbers I was throwing out have just been smashed. So, it's a good feeling.
Malaria is a disease that kills one to three million people a year. 300 to 500 million cases are reported. It's estimated that Africa loses about 13 billion dollars a year to the disease. Five dollars can save a life. We can send people to the moon; we can see if there's life on Mars - why can't we get five-dollar nets to 500 million people?
As I start to think about what I want to do next, there are eight or nine networks I would be thrilled to work with. I remember developing at FX and the executives there telling me, 'We don't want to do shows that 20 million people kind of like; we want to do the show that 2 million people really like.' That's such a refreshing thing to hear.
Gandhi, when he was on the salt march, had everyone singing the song of Rabindranath Tagore, which goes, 'Walk alone, walk alone...' Now there's some paradox in that, with a million people on the march! But he was cultivating the thought that each individual has dignity, and the dignity consists partly in the willingness to stand up to authority.