When a fan buys a ticket, we learn an enormous amount about them: What bands they like, where they live, how much they are willing to spend. Someday, a fan will be sitting in a bar and his cellphone will text message 'Sonic Youth are playing tonight. Do you want to go?' He'll buy his ticket over the phone and walk to the concert.

Part of calling ourselves Live Nation was about starting to shift the way we think, to be first and foremost fan-focused.

The touring business is obviously critical to selling records, building fan bases, selling T-shirts, fulfilling sponsorship commitments.

We can't say to a Ticketmaster venue that says they want to use a different ticketing platform, 'If you do that, we won't put shows in your building.'

Don't expect fame to come overnight. That filtered through to me in my own career. Look at Madonna: she's not the best singer in the world, but she's got where she has through hard work.

College was a very necessary step along the way to my professional career. As I look back, I realize how much of an eye opener it was for me in terms of moving forward and developing as a basketball player.

People have an idea that one is in control of a career, a lot more than you really are. You can engineer things to an extent. But you are at the mercy of what comes in across the desk.

I've always had very high aims for my life and for my career, for anything that I do.