Joseph Gordon-Levitt

Why you should listen

In Joseph Gordon-Levitt's own words: "I'm lucky. I found a creative outlet young. I started working as an actor when I was six years old. When I was 19, I quit acting to go to college. And a few years later (yes, I dropped out) when I tried to get back into it, nobody would give me a part. That really hurt.

"I realized my old creative outlet wouldn't work anymore, because it depended too much on other people. I had to be able to express myself on my own. And my personal metaphor for this was the REC button. 'HIT RECORD,' I'd say to myself. Push the button. Get started. Make something.

"What started as a private rallying cry became a humble website, which grew into a worldwide community of hundreds of thousands, an Emmy-winning production company, and now a new collaborative media platform. Irony is, today's HITRECORD is not about expressing yourself on your own. What we've found over the years is that the best way for many people to find their creative outlet is through collaborating with others."