Speaking with the Captain of Moonshots

His name is Astro Teller. His business card says he’s “Captain of Moonshots.” He runs one of the most fascinating (and secretive) labs at one of the most successful companies on the planet. Sound like someone you’d want to talk to? Us too!

And that’s exactly what we and several thousands of Udacity students did on Wednesday afternoon.

Astro Teller was our guest for Wednesday’s episode of Udacity Talks, our live chat event series featuring some of the most important thinkers in Silicon Valley. He sat down with our own Sebastian Thrun — who presented him with questions sent in by our students both in advance of the event, and in real time via social media and the YouTube live feed — and for the next 40 minutes or so proceeded to just deliver one pearl of wisdom after another. It was a literal clinic on vision, imagination, perseverance, and passion.

Here is just a small collection of some particularly delightful nuggets that we caught on social:

I hope the above conveys at least some sense of what a wonderful experience this was. Participants joined in from all over the globe: Brazil, Zimbabwe, Jamaica, Egypt, Turkey, to name just a few! If you were able to join us, thank you! If not, you can watch the playback right here (pro tip: the action starts at about the 8:03 mark!):

Don’t forget to RSVP for the next episode of Udacity Talks, featuring Jess Lee, CEO and Co-Founder, Polyvore. It’s going to be great!

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(This post was written by Christopher Watkins, Senior Writer, Udacity)