Gianroberto Casaleggio

"Behind Gianroberto Casaleggio there is only Gianroberto Casaleggio. An ordinary citizen who, with his work and his (limited) resources, seeks, without any public or private funding, perhaps deluding himself, sometimes even making mistakes, to improve the society in which he lives."

"I am here. I am here, that is my name. Beppe Grillo and I are on the same level. Whether I write or he writes, it does not matter. We are the founders of the ive Star Movement. This happened yesterday morning. Neither I nor Beppe Grillo have ever drawn up lists for municipal and regional elections. Neither I nor Beppe Grillo have ever written a municipal or regional programme. Neither I nor Beppe Grillo have ever given instructions for council votes, nor infiltrated people into the Five Star Movement."

"An idea is neither right-wing nor left-wing. It is an idea, good or bad."

"Show me a modern politician who doesn't understand the internet, and I'll show you a loser.ù"

"Every time you break a rule, you practically cancel it out."

"Direct democracy, made possible by the Internet, does not only relate to popular consultations, but to a new centrality of citizens in society. Current political and social organisations will be dismantled, and some will disappear. Representative democracy, by proxy, will lose its meaning. It is a cultural revolution rather than a technological one, which is why it is often misunderstood or trivialised."

"Every constituency should be able to dismiss and therefore remove from office any member of parliament who shirks their duties at any time through local referendums."

"The Internet will become like air, as Nicholas Negroponte prophesied."

"Facebook, Google and other web giants know more about us than our friends do, and in the future they will know even more. This information can be used for various purposes, not just to offer us products or services, as highlighted by the so-called “Datagate” scandal. Stricter control over the management of personal data by governments is needed, along with a new system of rules."

"For any information, it is necessary to trace it back to the primary source, and unfortunately this is not always the case for online publications. This is also true for Wikipedia, which considers newspapers and magazines to be reliable sources. In my case, it was first published in a magazine and then on Wikipedia that my father was a driver, but, while I have absolutely nothing against drivers, my father was a Russian interpreter."

"To achieve a goal, you have to believe in it, sometimes irrationally. This increases the chances of success."

"A person can believe words. But they will always believe examples."

"At the slightest doubt, no doubt."

"On the Internet, ideas are the real value. Intelligence, creativity and competence can easily do without money."

"In the Internet age, only a sense of community and belonging, recognising common values, will allow companies to survive."

"In the future, there will probably be two extremes: Orwellian dictatorships in which people think they know but in reality know nothing because the information they are given has been altered in some way. The other extreme is that of direct democracy, in which everyone participates and everyone is transparent."