It didn't come from the Government down. There was no dictum, no declaration, no censorship, to start with, no! Technology, mass exploitation, and minority pressure carried the trick, thank God.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes that technological advancements and societal pressures, rather than government mandates, drove significant changes in society.
Ray Bradbury highlights how the evolution of technology and the influence of social dynamics can lead to transformative changes without the need for government intervention. He appreciates the natural progression of societal shifts driven by innovation and collective action, suggesting a sense of optimism and gratitude for such organic developments.
In practice
In a discussion about how technology has shaped modern life, you could reference this quote to illustrate that change often comes from grassroots movements rather than top-down mandates.
I've written about 2,000 short stories; I've only published 300 and I feel I'm still learning. Any man who keeps working is not a failure. He may not be a great writer, but if he applies the old fashioned virtues of hard, constant labor, he'll eventually make some kind of career for himself as a writer. Ray Bradbury, 1967 interview (Doing the Math - that means for every story he sold, he wrote six "un-publishable" ones. Keep typing!)
I never went to college, so I went to the library.
There must be something in books, something we canβt imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You donβt stay for nothing.
I think the sun is a flower, That blooms for just one hour.
The first thing a writer should be is - excited. He should be a thing of fevers and enthusiasms. Without such vigor, he might as well be out picking peaches or digging ditches; God knows it'd be better for his health.
You can't try to do things; you simply must do them.
What we want to do is make a leapfrog product that is way smarter than any mobile device has ever been, and super-easy to use. This is what iPhone is. OK? So, we're going to reinvent the phone.
So many technologies start out with a burst of idealism, democratization, and opportunity, and over time, they close down and become less friendly to entrepreneurship, to innovation, to new ideas. Over time, the companies that become dominant take more out of the ecosystem than they put back in.
When I took office, only high energy physicists had ever heard of what is called the Worldwide Web... Now even my cat has its own page.
The web's earliest architects and pioneers fought for their vision of freedom on the Internet at a time when it was still small forums for conversation and text-based gaming. They thought the web could be adequately governed by its users without their needing to empower anyone to police it.
If people start to buy the idea that machines are great companions for the elderly or for children, as they increasingly seem to do, we are really playing with fire.
Bullhorns are overrated: having ten times as many Twitter followers generates approximately zero times as much value.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.