>> rose: welcome to the program. we begin this evening with mindy kaling. her television program is called ""the mindy project." >> for young women, particularly minority women, that i have the job that i have is exciting for them. and i know that i try not to think about it too much because i have too many other things to do, but being the first indian american woman with your own show, and the show is not particularly about race, is really exciting for people. and i love that, and it feels like a nice responsibility. >> we continue with john feinstein, the eighthor and sports reporter purpose his latest book is cape and the islands "where nobody knows your name, life in minor league baseball" and a look at the final four.

>> you're deal with guys that are extraordinary baseball players. i think we sometimes forget that because we focus on the super-stars making the multi-million-dollar contracts. the guys are 100 levels above guys like and you me. i played high school baseball. these guys are 100 levels above us. just to get to triple a, you've beaten the odds. >> rose: we conclude with a conversation of the web site impossible.com, and we talk with lily cole, jonathan zittrain, and david kirkpatrick about the internet and more. >> at this point in time it's all very normative things, peer to peer. and that's where i think hopefully the power lie lies isw we might meet needs we normally pay for. i can post out i'm getting rid of these things from my house. or i would love to borrow someone's guitar because i'm going to do a gig. or i could teach spanish or get advice on this, that, or the

other. >> rose: mindy kaling, john feinstein, lily cole, jonathan zittrain, and david kirkpatrick when we continue.

captioning sponsored by rose communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. >> rose: mindy kaling is the star of the ""the mindy project." the comedy series returns to fox this tuesday and has just been renewed for a third season. she is also the show's creator, writer, and coexclusive producer. i am pleased to have her here on this program. welcome. >> thank you. i am so happy to be here. >> rose: there is a measure of stardom in this building. a whole lot of young people work here busy behind computers and other kinds of machines, and when they somehow converge on the floor that i have my studio, you know that something special is going on between you and those people. they'll interrupt everything to come, as they did for you. what do you think it is? >> i'm so excited to hear that.

>> rose: what do you represent? >> what do i represent? i-- i don't know. you know, i think that for young women, particularly minority women, that i have the job that i have is exciting for them. and i know that i-- i try not to think about it too much because i i have too many other things to do, but being the first indian american woman with your own show and the show is not particularly about race is really exciting for people. and i love that. and it feels like a nice responsibility. >> rose: what is it about? >> what is the show about? >> rose: yeah. >> the show is about being a better person. and it's about someone who is flawed and selfish and boy crazy, who is terrified of aging. who is very professionally busy and accomplished, but who is fixated on things that are sort of a little bit beneath her

intelligence, but she's still fixated on them. i know plenty of women who are college educated -- doctors, lawyers, professors, even, who are candidly want to get married, and they have great lives. they have money. they have great relationships with their friends, and they want to get married. and there is an embarrassment you feel if you're a little over-educated for wanting those things but it exists. and that's kind of what this show is about, i think. >> rose: i knew a little bit about you preparing for this conversation. you know a little bit about me. and when i sat down with you-- this is true-- you just seem like a person i would really like to know because we talked about magazine covers. we talked about observations about life. you know, and i think that's part of what you have. people feel like they're interested in what you say and who are you because there's an authenticity about you. >> that's very kind of you. that's such a nice compliment. the nicest thing that i hear,

and i hear it a lot, is women especially saying they wished they-- that i was their best friend, which is i think -- >> i wish you were my best friend. >> i don't hear it from straight men that often, so i will say that's a little bit more-- that's very nice to hear. >> rose: here is your book. "is everyone hanging out without me?" i mean, here is "elle" magazine. all of this suggests you created your own thing, and then they came to you. >> i am very proud of the way that i have made my way. because i do feel that i-- my mother was a surgeon. my father is an architect. they grew up in india. they met in africa and then came here. and there's no people on tv on either side of my family, no entertainers to speak of. and i was just really blessed to have parents who growing up loved jerry seinfeld, loved bill cosby, loved george carl and i

know they encouraged this, although they didn't quite understand it. and i just eye really feel-- and this is-- this is going to make me sound like i'm 1,000 years old, but this could only happen in america, and i'm weirdly patriotic because my parents are immigrants and i feel so unbelievably luck they it just came from grit, you know. i don't know how many 34-year-old women talk about their own grit, but i -- >> meaning determination and will. >> determination. my mother, who is an ob/gyn, emigrated to this country, and worked backbreakingly hard to have a career here, especially after moving from africa. i virtually never saw my parents growing up because of how hard they worked and i aplield that to entertainment which worked out, which to me just makes me feel kind of good about the country in a way, because i couldn't have done this in india, i don't think. >> rose: and you have in fact said if i knew i was going to

have my own show, i'd have to do it myself. >> absolutely. >> rose: what's the vision for ""the mindy project"? >> i love romantic comedies and i've spoken about it a lot. and what are silly about them and what are wonderful about them. in general i found recently in romantic comedies the focus is on romance and not comedy at all. i think now it's just about romance and silliness and girls wearing fancy dresses and falling into cakes and things like that. and i came up "the office" and i came up from a group of very hard comedy writers, and they're -- >> of which you were one. >> i believe i am. if i can say that. and i believe in hard joke writing and the people that i love write hard jokes. they get-- you're in the trenches, and i think that to have a show with a female lead and people often say that i'm very girlie, i take such pride

in writing jokes, and it's a very old-fashioned thing. it's something like mel brooks did, sid caesar did. and that's how i was trained at "the office." and tina fey puts a huge value on the hard joke. and i wanted that to be in my show. >> rose: what's a hard joke? >> i'm tell you what it's not fthat's okay. there's a lot of shows that are on, like, attitude. and it's irreverent attitude-- which by the way is very interesting and fashion and poses. a hard joke to me, first of all, makes you laugh out loud, and a lot of comedies they watch-- by the way, i'm not saying my show necessarily would make you laugh out loud. i think it's funny. but a show that sounds like there was a-- like a crafted joke and it has, like -- >> it shows craftsmanship. >> yes. >> rose: exactly. well written. people know it's been finally

tuned. seinfeld has said to me and others, it's not easy. he finally stopped the "seinfeld" show because it was so hard and they wanted to load up the truck and drop money on him. he said, "no, i was writing on christmas eve last year. i don't want to be doing that this year. it's hard." >> it's hard, especially with someone who is a master of jokes. because he's so good, like louis ck, for instance, spills his whole life. he's one of the funniest people i think ever born. and he just seems like he's telling stories of his life but it's filled with jokes and seinfeld is amazing in another way because he doesn't let you in at all and he lives and dies by the goodness of his jokes and they're so good. >> rose: where are you on that arc? >> they're both masters. the character in the show is very wild and parties. but i myself am very different

from her. i mean, i was saying on this show last year, i think i counted she had something like nine boyfriends on the show. and i was thinking like, god, i have-- i only know nine men in my life, in my entire life i think i've met nine men. >> rose: because you've been working so hard. >> yeah. i like that about the character, that's really fun. but i'm more retiring. i like to -- >> does stardom change that? >> i don't upon that i have stardom, actually. i think that-- i'm on the cover of this, but i think that in general -- >> it's "elle"magazine. do you know how many people would kill to be on the cover of "elle." >> i love it. i love how serious i look. that's what's nice about the fashion magazines is i-- they tell you not to smile, and you do look much more alluring when you don't smile but adjectives like "alluring" and "mysterious" if you're me and my personality you live your whole life to be

told you're alurling. >> rose: and smokey. >> that's why i love the cover. though not a representation of what my personality is like. >> here is what b.j. covac said. he said, "she's a gangster." >> i love that. >> rose: what do you think he meant? >> well, i think he meant-- and i don't think he meant this in a bad way-- there are some very masculine aspects of my personality. and -- >> tough, determined, driven? >> decisive. >> rose: decisive. >> when i started at the show, i think people were surprised how decisive i was. and in general, we don't see that in women, especially not noentertainment, decisiveness without disclaimers. and in fact it can seem very curt. but when i say i like something or don't like something, and i notice a lot of women are like, "i feel like that might be a good option, although i see both sides of it." and i'm not like that at all.

which in a man seems natural and inspires confidence. in a woman, it can seem brusque. and i know that. and i sometimes wish i wasn't that way. but i can't help it. i'm impatient, which i think is another gangster quality. but i watched-- did you ever see the september issue, it's a documentary about anna winter. and they asked her what makes you a good leader? and the timing was perfect. without hesitation she said, "my decisiveness." and people think she's cold. and i bet it's because of-- they're scared by her certainty. and i thought well, it's not that bad. she's one of the great minds. >> rose: i just interviewed larry page, and i think he would say the same thing. >> yes. >> rose: in other words, they don't let perfect be the enemy of good. they're prepared to make a decision, even if it might not be a perfect decision. >> i love that.

that's so perfectly how i live my life so of course i love it. that's a very-- i want to memorize that so i can justify my nature. >> rose: since we're talking about the "the mindy projec "th" tell me about mindy leherey. >> mindy leherey-- i love her and i think she's an incredibly original character because she's politically all over the map. she has real streaks of libertarianism. she says absolutely selfish and crazy things sometimes which is so fun as a character. i alec baldwin in "30 rock" some of the things he says are such gifts. my character says, "i don't like that america recycles. i think it makes us look poor, frankly." she has that kind of energy about it and she has the conviction of knowing things are correct because she feels they're correct. >> rose: could you make her

more interesting? i mean, is it possible to make her more interesting because she's the way she has the background she has and looks the way she does? >> my character probably could not exist. i think it's a good point, if she was not indian. >> rose: exactly. >> because if i was being played by, frankly, a thin, beautiful blond woman, you might find it incredibly insufferable. but i have the traipings of a marginalized person, and when that person is disiels decisively saying sort of conservative things and all over the map things-- another thing about my character which i love is she's constantly insisting that she's young and hot to everyone. and she's always saying like, "i'm a smoking hot doctor who makes a lot of money. why can't i meet anybody?" and she has this confidence that's, like, so delusional. and i don't see a lot. >> rose: it's not my fault. it's somebody else's fault i'm not meeting somebody. >> right. people are pitted against her. she's very plucky and people

can't really get her down, which i think is nice. >> rose: here's a clip from the spring premiere episode of "the mindy project," coming up on april 1. here it is. >> another you two, get out of here. go do something useful, all right, scram. sit down. see this? i want you to show me on this what you did to cliff last night. >> what? show me. >> okay, this is dumb. sure, fine, danny. his arm was-- i don't know, like, here, and his hand was i guess a bit cupped. >> on your breast. >> yes. >> and what else, what else? >> my hand was here, and that-- >> that's the groin. >> i did not sleep with cliff. i slept next to cliff because he was very, very sad. nothing major happened. >> wait a minute. what do you mean nothing major happened? >> i massaged his jeans. >> was he in the jeans? >> cliff might have my hand, but

you, you have my heart. and you have to write his grandmother'grandmother'sgrandm. >> you write it by yourself unless you sprained your hand last night. you know what i mean? >> rose: that's her. >> that's her. >> rose: tell me about the relationship with danny. >> danny is another corkt that works in the office in the beginning of the first season they had a very adversarial relationship but over the course of two years have become very friendly, and there's been sort of a sexual tension building underneath them. and his character, like my character, is incredibly strong and confident. very masculine. >> rose: played by chris mussina. >> who is unbelievable. he's so good. he had not done a lot of comedy when i first approached him for the role. he, in fact, was in "damages" playing a soldier in iraq. but there was something about

his intensity, and i come off-- i sound like a 15-year-old girl when i talk as you can see, and there's something about him that was so masculine and so tough they thought played very well with my energy. and it turned out to be correct because i think we have good chemistry. >> rose: all the cameos, specifically james franco, come out of your mind? >> we're very lucky on the show because it's a dating show, and so many of my friends who are writers and creators are men who could be people they dated. so we have a lot of writeerly actors on the show. franco came on. he was so funny and not surprisingly very strange on the show. he's wonderful. seth rogan. glenn howington. we have a lot of writer-performers who come and play my boyfriend. >> rose: does your success represent anything about diversity, anything about the possibilities of expanding the world of women in comedy?

>> i hope so. i hope so. i mean, even when i started on "the office," and that was nine years ago, when i started on that show, there were not that many female-led comedy shows. and now several of my favorite shows, like "veep" "30 rock" that's sorts of the way of life. not only are they led by women-- lena dunham, tina fey-- they created their own shows. so even in the years i've been here, that changed a lot. being a dark-skinned minority, i hope there are more women who look like me who have their own shows. carrie washington on "scandal." and that's a hit show with many, many more millions of people watch that show. >> rose: what do you think of lena dunham's work? >> i love lena. i love lena, and i think -- >> love her or love the character or both? >> i think on purpose the character is hard to love. that is a very, very interesting and very selfish character.

>> rose: because she's exhibitionist? >> the exhibitionist thing has never bothered me, although a lot of other people are bothered by it. she is in many ways like my character. the character is supremely confident in which she doesn't necessarily have the goods to back it up. and that makes her controversial. lena is a true artist and i don't think she's setting out to do a sitcom. i think she's setting out to do a show that she likes that happens to be really funny and i think there are parts of the show that are brilliant. sometimes i feel old for that show. lena is nine years younger than me. >> rose: you're not in the target audience. >> i think i am in the target audience, but i think the show fearlessly-- it's a very frank show. i'm on a network show about romance and love and doctors. but me personally, i-- i-- nudity and frankness in sexual situations and things like that, i am just the way that i was

raised. i am very shy around it because i wasn't-- i didn't-- you know, my parents aren't distinguished artists the way that lena was that were raised that way. >> rose: she grew up in an environment that was much more accepting of-- >> yes, she grew up in manhattan with artists as parents. yeah, i-- yeah, i didn't have that same experience. i'm not saying it's always comfortable watching it, but i always-- i love it. and i will say this-- oridge nalt, there's nothing like it on television. and originality is truly, i think, the most important thing on any show. it's why the people who love my show love it because they are not finding that in any other show. and why lena is such a lightning rod because whatever you'll say about her, no one's doing it, and only she can do it. so -- >> did you realize that about yourself at an early age, they have to find what's unique and original about me and write to that? you know, i-- i don't know if i looked for it.

you know, i saw dave shapelle on the show and you guys were talking about the essence of funny. >> rose: right. >> and he even qualified it by saying i know this is going to sound cocky but there are just people who are funny. and i have felt in my life that when people are drawn to me and my opinions, it's always been the things that are less effortful, which i always thought was very lucky. my-- to be kind of a new money child of immigrants, and i'm very patriotic, and i have this very strange mix of qualities who loves comedy, lovesritiness and glitz, all those things are-- i'm blessed with them, i'm blessed with kind of this original point of view for many americans, and if i stay true to it, what i really love, people respond to it. what's so weird to me is there aren't a lot of people like me. there are girls who like the show and it is reaching them. and that's one of the nicest

things about the show, it's resinating for people who are not the child of indian immigrant. it's interesting. >> rose: is it for you a logical extension of "the office?" >> i run my writers' room, because greg daniels who createdly the american office to me is my mentor, brilliant. the type of writers on my show are very similar to "the office." a couple of whom are from the "the office." i run the room the same way. that was a mocumentary. what was beautiful about it was what was beautiful is what was simple and my show was not at all like that. what was beautiful is beautiful. people have nice clothes. they have money. it's in new york city. it's not scranton, pennsylvania. but i run the room in the same way. so tonally, i actually think there's a lot of similarities. >> rose: and you learned what from correl. >> from correl? well, on "the office" i was

number 14 on the call sheet, which means if there are 13 actors that precede me in importance. in hollywood they're kind of nice because they kind of openly say things like that, i'm number 14, which is very low on the totem pole. and steve, of course, is number one. what's nice is you're number 14 and are on a show for eight years, you don't have that many lines so you listen. i'm in these long six-page scene that steve made stow famous where he's in the conference room offending virtually every person. some of the lines i wrote. i wrote 25 episodes of "the office." i watched him and it was like going to graduate school. i don't care if you are the least funny person in the world, if you spend eight years with steve correl and watch him over and over for 16 hours a day you become funny. >> rose: you mean you think funny? >> i think you pick up comedy cadences. ed helms was on that show. i went into the show-- i think i was a funny person --

>> at age 24. >> osmosis. you're just like how could you not be funny when steve correl is doing that for so long? so i was very lucky that way. >> of. >> rose: or you must be funny because they hired me to work here. >> no one will tell me i suffer from lack of confidence. one of the great things being an indyoon woman on the show that there are things steve did, that i believe i'm straight up copying, comedy moves, but you would never suspect it on me because i'm an indian woman and it doesn't translate as copying, and that's one of the great benefits of kind of looking the way that i do. >> rose: is that part of what you think the characters in the "the mindy project" that they see, it is this confidence, and at the same time you're looking for a relationship and you're looking for love and all the other things, but there is a confidence about mindy? >> it is -- >> and that's what young women identify with. they can almost project.

>> i think they really like. >> rose: "that's what i would like to be" they say to themselves. >> i hope so. >> rose: "that's the attitude i would like to have." >> she never gets upset. and in the show, many people, every episode tell her she is overweight, not acting professionally. and the things that typically make women in this country at least, women that i know, feel less than or powerless, being told they're fat, they're ugly, they're too old, tend not to affect her. and i love that i can play that character. she's a little delusional, and she does a lot of terrible things, but that particular sensitivity doesn't affect her. and it's-- if women can look to that or me because i, weirdly, am often-- you know, i read comments about me, and i always said this and i think this comes from my mother because both of

my parents were hire educated. people can tell you you're fat. they can tell you you're hugly. but if they tell you you're not smart, that's the worst. >> rose: cuts the deepest. >> cuts the deepest. if you are not smart-- they put a premium on education, first of all, but that is truly a shameful thing to be uneducated. >> rose: so what do your parents think of all this? >> my father dliets in it. i think that-- so the show is know-- it's racy and there's sexy stuff in it. >> rose: but they don't mind that. >> he doesn't mind it. he thinks it's great. my mother would have loved it. she passed away two years ago, but she would have loved it. and my mother did not-- she was unimpressed by almost everything. she loved "the office," but she would give me her honest opinion when she didn't think it was funny. >> rose: was that good for you? >> that was very good. and your toughness of mind could accept it or not? >> my mom was very glamorous and

very morfiddable. she was a surgeon, and when she said something to me-- she would never tell me a compliment unless it was 100% true, and she was one of those people-- andim sure you have one in your life-- where you believe them inherently. you get to a certain level where you start wondering if people around you are telling you things you want to hear, and she was that person for me more than -- >> more than anybody. >> more than anybody, my brother, my father, she was that person, and she would have loved it. she would have had her list of suggestions, but i think she would have really liked it. >> rose: 2.8 million followers on twitter. 2.8 million. followers. is that something that you with great urgency and will wanted to have, a strong presence in social media?

>> no, and i think that i'm-- i'm 34. and i think i'm just a little bit aged out of-- i still think of social media-- because i didn't have facebook in high school, as a-- i'm a little suspicious of it. and i love twitter, but i think of it as a trifle because i didn't have it at the time when it could have been important because i got into twitter at age 30 as opposed to age 16, i love it, but it-- it seems like bubblegum to me. so to put any importance on social media is to me is not sort of a good use of-- good use of time. when people submit scripts as writers to my show -- >> so how do you end up with 2.3 million followers? >> i guess i'm just really funny, charlie. >> rose: finally, think about this for me, when you dream, what do you dream? when you think about what might be, what do you think?

i mean, is it oprah-like? >> wow. i want so much. that's the problem. is that i have-- i have too many desires, and it's a good thing that i'm hindu, because my desires of what my ambitions encompass many more lives than the one i have right now. i want too much. and it's-- it's why i can't stick to a diet, to be honest, because i want to try that, and i want to try that, and i want to do that. and it's the same thing with my career. it's like i look at oprah, and i'm like, yeah, that's pretty amazing. she has an empire. people know her. and then i look at woody allen or wes anderson, who don't produce anyone else's works. they just do their own. and j.j. abrams who does a lots of other people's works and directs. >> rose: on every platform. >> and i want kids.

i'm that kind of classic narcissist. i'm great i some see more of me. younger versions of me should be around. i don't know how i'm going to do it all. i have to do some of it in another lifetime. but i-- you know, my eyes have always been bigger than my stomach as they say. so i hope -- >> i haven't heard that since my mother told me that. >> it's something older women say. it's not like a sexy thing that a young television actress maybe should say but i do feel that way. i'd love to direct something they wrote. that would be nice. >> rose: thank you for coming. >> of course, thank you for having me. >> rose: it was a pleasure. >> rose: john feinstein is here. he has written about sports for more than 30 years and written well. he is also a radio host and regular commentator on the golf channel. his latest book takes us behind the scenes of life in the minor lesion of baseball. it is called "where nobody knows your name." i am pleased to have him back at this table.

welcome. >> charlie, always good to be with you. >> rose: this is number 30? >> 32, actually. because the kids books confuses the numbers but 32 all together. >> rose: so what's important to know about minor league baseball? >> that you're dealing with guys who, first of all, are, extraordinary baseball players. i think sometimes we forget that because we focus so much on the super stars, who are making the multi-million-dollar contracts. the guys at that next level, when it's in golf or in basketball or in this case in baseball, are 100 levels above guys like you and me. i played high school baseball. these guys are 100 levels above us, just to get to the point where you're in aaa, you've beaten the odds. >> rose: this question, then. >> okay. >> rose: what's the difference between the best of, say, aaa and baseball, and average player in the majors? >> it's usually one thing. if you have power in a major league ballpark to get a ball out of the ballpark, or does it only go to the warning trap? whereas in aaa, it goes out of

the ballpark. can you hit the breaking pitch on the outside corner and take it to the opposite field. if you're a pitcher on 3-1 can you throw a change-up not right over the center of the plate? it's usually one small thing, one small weakness. it's an inability to do something at that same elite level as some major leaguers. sometimes guys get injured and they don't throw as hard as they used to. the way i got the title for this book. do you remember mark pryor, pitched for the cubs, on the mound for the famous bartman game in 2003. i was at a game in lehigh value vale, he was trying to come back as a middle relief pitcher, he had injuries and can't throw the way he did, and as he's jogging in, every park has a promotion-- and the promotion then was whack an intern. it's a box with four holes, four

interns climb in and two fans take plastic bats and whack the interns. whoever whacks the intern the most wins. while they're playing that game in jogs mark pryor, and nobody sees it's mark pryor or remembers who he once was. and that's where i got the name, nobody knows your name here, no matter who you once were. >> rose: and not only, that the mode of transportation and privileges are quite different. >> very different. there are huge differences. the minimum salary for a major league player is $500,000. most minor leaguers make under $100,000. they travel in the major leagues obviously charter planes and stay at the four season seasonse ritz. nobody picks up a bag and carries it. in the minor lesion, you're in charter buses and staying in the hampton inn, courtyard marriott or whatever and you carry your own bags and have a roommate. brett tomko who has pitched in

28 cities, is trying to make a comeback in at 41. said the food in a major league clubhouse isn't that different than the food in a minor league clubhouse but it tastes different. >> rose: and there is this. what is the average lengthave major league career? >> the average length is probably-- because you can talk about guys who don't make it for very long is six to seven to eight years. but the great ones like a derek jeter stick around 15-20 years. it's a much longer career than football. it's probably the longest, along with hockey, of the professional years if you're good enough. what's interesting is the number of guys in their 30s who are still in aaa. who have been in the major leagues briefly or been there a while. guys i encounter in the book, i mentioned pryor, miguel tejada who was an m.v.p., was in aaa, trying to get back to the major lesion one more time. he did last year in kansas city. >> rose: where is he this

year? >> retired. dontrelle willis, rookie of the year with the marlins, was trying to get back to the major lesion. he ended up retiring without making it back. >> rose: what percentage make it back once they're in the majors and dip into the minors. >> probably once in four or five. once you make it to aaa, your chances are 1 in 3. and when you're craftd-- you have to be really good to get drafted-- your chances are 3% of ever making the major lesion. >> rose: are there stories of anybody in aaa for three or foreyiewrs and makes it to the majors and is a huge star? >> yeah, there are guys like that who are late bloomers. yes, who stay in the minor lesion for a long time. one of the devise i dealt with, nate mcclaus, amend it to the majors early, was an all star, but ended up not only back in the minors but was released by the pittsburgh pirates. he was hitting .140. he was out of baseball. he got signed by the orioles to go to norfolk because they needed an extra outfielder.

he got hot in norfolk. got called up to the orioles. markakis got hurt and he started in left field and this winter signed a two-year contract with washington for $11 million. that's the kind of hope that keeps guys going. the book is called "where nobody knows your name," by john feinstein. final four, i know you don't predict who will win. >> because i'm always wrong. >> rose: and you vote with your heart, too. >> always. i still think duke's going to make it. >> rose: i was-- had them win simply because i think if they do win, it would just be great. but who looks strong to you? not who is going to win, but give me a sense of what we should look for? i mean you've got kentucky coming of age. florida-- >> one game doesn't mean they're coming of age. i'm not necessarily buying into kentucky yet. they played great against wichita state. they finally showed how great

they are. >> rose: why does they not cobetter this year? >> because they're a young immature teem. john calipari keeps complaining about how young his team is. he recruited them? and mercer started five seniors in every game. theatre only team in the country that did that. >> that's what mike shechef ski said. >> he went into the dressing room to congratulate him and it stuns me that there are people who criticized him for doing that. they said it was a grand stand play. you know him, he doesn't do grand stand plays. >> rose: he had such a respect. that's his nature to respect somebody-- >> he does. he's the best loser i ever met in all my years in sports. he's better at losing and dealing with losing than anybody i ever met. >> rose: how good is he at coaching? >> he's very good at coaching. he's won more games than anybody. >> rose: who do you like gilike frrd a lot. they haven't lost a game with their entire team intact this

year. their two losses early were when they had a couple of kids out. they have four seniors who made it to the elite 8 three times and never made to the final four. they have a wonderful point guard. >> rose: thank you, good to have you. the book again "where nobody knows your name." >> rose: lily cole is a 26-year-old former honors graduate of cambridge. she created a web site called impossible.com. it functions as an awnlt social platform that allows users to post their wishes and help fulfill the dreams of others. it launched in may 2013 at cambridge university. it makes its u.s. debut this month. this comes at a time when the internet still faces battles over access and control in places like chine and the middle east. here at home, the n.s.a. faces criticism as it tries to balance respect for internet privacy with its concerns over u.s. security. joining lily cole is jonathan zittrain, professor at harvard

law school, and cofounder of the berkman center for internet and society. and david kirkpatrick, and the founder and c.e.o. and host of the media company tacon me and the author of "the facebook effect: the inside story of the company that is connecting the world," and recently interviewed mark zuckerberg. i am pleased to have all of them here at this table and we begin with lily. tell me where this came from and what you hope it achiefs. >> impossible.com began three years ago. a friend and i were talking about the economy and it was just kind of postrecession, and we were talkin talking about wht when economies falter that societies automatically falter. if you think about it intuitively we all have the same amount of skills and resources. we've lost the means of orienting them around. and we were discussing communities and the fact that nowadays society is so complicated that it's often very hard to see the opportunities. i grew up in london and lived in new york and you don't often

know what your neighbors need and you can't see the opportunities to move things around. we said what if there was an internet platform, a web site, that would do just that, try to surface these possibilities. and i-- i was in my last year of university, and for the next six months, kind of became obsessed with the idea, and wondering why something seemingly quite simple didn't exist or exist to scale. and i also started to research the concept of the gift economy in mostly anthropological texts and became very inspired by what i continue to recognize as the social value that the gift economy might offer. so i went on this kind of journey trying to build it. >> rose: jonathan, put this in the context of what's going on in the internet and the significance as an ideal. >> well, i can think of two things that really connect. one is gift economy is a phrase we're hearing a lot lately and it's probably worth dividing it up is into two section.

one of which are those services who allow people who aren't normally in the business of selling things to be able to sell or barter them. there are ride sharing services. you can maybe even lend out your car or a room in your house. that's one thing. but it's really just emphasis on economy. it's people selling stuff or renting that they wouldn't otherwise have a market for. i think the kind of stuff that lily's talking about is more on the gift side of gift economy that has to do with people able to efficiently make connection with one another in a way that's meaningful, where they come away happier for having given something as they might for having received it. i would probably put wikipedia in that category where you have people engaged in exchange where they're presently surprised how well that can work. and that leads to my second observation, much of the internet infrastructure, the real stuff that makes the internet happen, was built along the lines of that second kind of gift economy. the people that designed internet protocol chose not to

patent or copyright it. the fellow who invented the web did not patent or copyright it. and it's probably telling. that's reflected in so many ways, including it's much hard tore lock down your wifi station than to leave it open. >> rose: the idea here is this is a part of the internet and a part of the economy which is not transactional. >> yes. >> rose: it is really part of-- you give something that you want to make a contribution for your own psychic income or other reasons, yes? >> yes. and the idea is if you do that, and someone else does the same to you, you will still get a return. it just won't be direct. so it won't be transactional in the same way we understand. >> rose: what do you think of this, david? >> i think the internet is so disruptive of the economy that we think of traditionally, and this is a really good example of one of the ways that that's happening. there are forms of transaction, forms of relationships that are possible because of this universal connectedness that's now increasingly global, that

what lily is doing is wonderful because it's so fundamentally optimistic. i think we could see a lot of disruptive things that are happening that are not nearly so optimistic but are potentially equally disruptive. i love the way the internet is disruptive, but it is very unpredictable. i find something like what she's doing to be wonderfully unpredictable. >> rose: is this a kinship to kickstarter where people are not getting a benefit but just doing something because they believe this thing that they support will do something good? >> i was saying that to lily earlier today that i thought what she's doing has a lot in common with indy gogo, or kickstarter. you want to support somebody's play -- >> do you agree with this? >> yes. >> rose: it springs out of the same place. i want to give something without getting something in return for the greater good. >> i think they're serving different purposes. i don't think what we do would fill the space that kickstarter operates in, but in terms of how

kickstarter descruptz, how things can be funded and disrupts typical economics and empowers people through that process and brings together people for a reason other than a normative transactional reason, i think there are a lot of similarities. >> rose: 85 me a person who would use this and a person who would receive benefit from this? >> the way people post it's written like a tweet. so it's very open. the only ground rule is everything is done for free. you're asking for things or offering things with the understanding. but thereby it becomes very open. some people have been using it for advice. some people have been offering languages or asking for languages. some people are giving products. >> rose: here's what i don't understand about you. what is it you want to do? you went to cambridge and did well. you were a model and did well. well, being on the cover of magazines, i guess. you've had small roles in a couple of movies. >> yeah. >> rose: now you've create aid web site. what is it you want to do? >> um, i'm driven by two things for the most part.

one is creativity. so i still continue to act and i'm doing a play this summer, every year pretty much for the last eight years. and i will continue that a few months a year. and then i have a vein in me that's very kind of socially driven, politically driven, environmentally driven. and that for me has been an ongoing process, and interest tell, impossible relates to i think some of the work i've done previously through fashion looking at economics as a vehicle to social and environmental problems or change. so by working in fashion i started looking at supply chain issues and trying to-- trying to basically speak for the four of transparency and and speak to the idea that consumers have a huge impact on the world by the way they spend their money, kind of the idea of voting with your money. and so i worked at the body shop, for example, for a few years with that grounding and

traveled and explored a trade around the aid model. and i also founded a company in the u.k., where we get grandmas to knit and put their names on the label and the point was to create a connection between prosecutors and consumers. >> rose: you said acting to reinforce a social acting may be due to self-interest. s it may also be because people have genuinely decided to treat others' interests as their own, you know. it's the psychic income, for lack of a better word. >> yes, and i think that's why a platform as generative as impossible wants to be, it could go in any number of directions-- some better, some worse. but i think the best directions are, one, if people bring to it an expectation of something interesting is going to happen, something unusual, they're going to meet someone, not just the may get a guitar lesson as if it were a coupon for me but i'll be

in some new frame of human interaction that is safe and fun and fulfilling. that would be great. i think of it as something like couchsurfing.nen. we would never have thought that would work. people would give up their couches for no particular reason except maybe someone would play a song and do a dishes and for someone else, i will go to a foreign country and sleep on someone else. this is the next step generalizing that. and priming the pump with lily personally-- she's in the public eye, has a good measure of celebrity, so there's a lot of people who are fans of hers and they're look for some way to express their energy about it, this seems an amazing channel for that. >> rose: let me turn to big, broad themes. you said the internet is facing a major battle for its soul. >> nice. >> rose: between its commercial versus social control versus open, rich versus poor. >> that's kind of the

consequence of something becoming so truly global, connecting all of humapt, which then becomes a platform, for better or worse, all the impulses of humanity. i mean, one of the points i would just love to make, lily's work right now has idealism very much in the forefront, but in fact a lot of the things that are embedded in impossible have been part of internet efforts at scale for some time. in my book about facebook, zuckerberg talked to me about the pot latch as an inspiration for him, which is this native american ceremony in northwest coast where all the members of the community put in anything they have to this common pool and then anyone can take what they need from it. and he felt at that time anyway, that facebook was representative of a similar set of impulses by posting your ideas on facebook, you are contributing something to the common kind of shared resource that people could then extract what was good for them or not. many people find that very

unlike what they see facebook to be today. but i actually think that kind of idealistic impulse really is aat the root of a lot of the big internet companies that we see today, even a company like microsoft has some of that in its d.n.a. at the same time, we have people like putin playing a role in the world today that you had a great discussion of earlier that is so frightening. and i think he is also able to exercise power in a different way because of this universal form of communication. it can be an instrument of control as well as an instrument of freedom. >> rose: having said that, changing a little bit, you wrote a book called "the future of the internet and how to stop it." >> true. >> rose: what is it we need to stop? >> well, i think we need to stop a movement that happens when early idealism of the sort david was just describing and lily in some ways is representing, gives

way to a swing of the pendulum towards a form of defensiveness and even cynicism because a few bad apples can really ruin things. and figuring out what to do when things become important enough to be worth subverting and ruining is a puzzle almost every successful generative technology faces. wick peeled pooedia has to deal with vandals. couch surfer has to deal with people, et cetera. that's what i worry about for the internet. i worry what stharts very good can cend up becoming a too powerful platform. >> going back to your point before, even in our own country, the fact that we have these extraordinarily ambitious companies that have achieved so much like amazon, google, facebook, apple, et cetera. and at the same time, we have a government that has chosen to use the internet sort of subversively, and in many people's opinion, illegally, or at least too convertly in ways that we find threatening, and certainly those companies find exreemedly worrisome because it

reduces trust in the use of the internet at a very fundamental level. so you want to talk about the battle between good and evil. i think it is right in front of our eyes in the news we read every day right now. >> rose: i see all the problems that you're talking about. it seems to me the biggest problem facing the internet for me is giving as many people on the planet access as possible. that is the biggest challenge. >> well, and a number of the usual suspect firms would happily agree with you, that is a challenge, because those are markets they want to reach as much as anybody, and i agree that's a challenge. at the same time, we need to keep an eye on when they have access, what is it they will be getting access to. >> yes. >> will it be an unfilter, and with what device will they be accessing. >> rose: do you believe a filterredly internet is important no internet? >> if i'm offered a stark choice

between the two at any given moment, you bet i want the filtered internet rather than none. i'd also rather have it with a box i can hack so i can tunnel around and get the rest. >> and knowing it's filtered -- >> that's exactly right. an awareness of the what the government is doing i think is a fundamental question, too. >> and i'd love to preserve an ecosystem where people aren't just faced with that choice and, therefore, settle for half a loaf. it's up to us to try to produce the full loaf which is why media companies as well should be really engaged with efforts to get their bits out, even if they are filtered on the receiving side. >> rose: on the idea of farmers in africa being able to use the internet to get some kind of sense of where the weather is and all those things, access to seeds and that kind of thing, seems to me to be such a leap forward. >> you know this is zuckerberg's top kind of big project right now is internet.org, which he talked about very ream, and he believes it is a human right for everyone to have access to basic

internet services which might include weather or basic chat. he would say social media wikipedia. >> rose: and then larry page jumps in and talks about access to medical stuff. >> and larry page is contributing to it with his balloons, too. access to medical-- i think a lot of these companies are working concretely towards this goal not to mention we've seen markets on their own do some amazing work with the dissemination of cell phones and smart phones to a surprisingly large number of people and the exponential growth of that is extraordinary. >> sorry, there's an interesting-- do you know the web index, for two years now, it was the end of the laf year we talked about the measures country by country, access to the internet, how open it is, how much it's surveyed. it's got a long way to go. and that's why he ask a lot of indexing and brings attention to these ideas. >> rose: this is the 25th anniversary of the web, isn't it? 25 years.

>> doesn't look a day over 50. i've been waiting to see this, a 50-year-old guy pretending to be a 25-year-old. >> yes, indeed. >> it's transformative impact is still to be felt. >> rose: thank you, lily, good luck. >> thank you very much. >> rose: thank you, great to see you, jonathan. great to see you, david. captioning sponsored by rose communications captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

captioning by vitac, underwritten by fireman's fund announcer: the following kqed production was produced in hi-definition. ♪ >> yes, "check, please!" people. >> it's all about licking your plate. >> the food is just fabulous. >> i should be in psychoanalysis for the amount of money i spend in restaurants. >> i had a horrible experience. >> i don't even think we were at the same restaurant. >> and everybody, i'm sure, saved room for those desserts.