TED talks - very inspiring videos
January 11th, 2008 | Published in Blog, Tips Galore, Videos | 2 Comments
My favourite pastime when I am riding a bus or the underground is to watch video clips on my iPod Touch from the american elite conference TED (Technology Entertainment Design). It “brings together the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).”
They made the smart decision to post all of those talks online, and they do it in a very professional way. Watch some of them and then contemplate: Would you want to attend a TED conference in the future? Or would you rather just watch the videos? Well, millions have already watched the videos and TED is sold out every year a long time ahead.
For example, they have a new rating system for the videos: Most jawdropping, most persuasive, most inspiring, most courageous, most fascinating, most ingenious, most beautiful and funniest.
The famous talk by the Swedish researcher Hans Rosling talk “New insights on poverty and life around the world “is in the “Most jawdropping” category, you will understand why!
It is interesting to note that Hans Rosling held his first talk on TED in 2006 and ever since this talk was posted online he has received speaking requests from all over the world.
See also the TED video introduction:
Also check out the TED blog, highly recommended!











January 30th, 2008 at 4:10 pm (#)
TED is good, but IMHO feels slightly dated in the same way portals do. I.e. here someone provides you with t h e i r selection of what is ‘best’. Of course, most times it is really good, but the selection is alsp very limited. If you instead just fire up iTunes and click on iTunes U in the left hand column, you can choose from a gigantic multitude of lectures from almost all American universities. In other words, instead of having to be content with what TED selects for you, you can make up your own selection. And, in most cases, even subscribe to lectures as podcasts in iTunes or Google Reader.
January 30th, 2008 at 4:15 pm (#)
Hi Root,
you have a point there, but for most people, isn’t it all about selection and packaging?
TED is very elegantly packaged, and you know that they pick some of the most interesting people in th eworld to speak, so why bother searching around amongst thousands of people at university sites in iTunes?