10 June 2007

The whole world is watching TEDGlobal bloggers

TEDGlobal 2007 has been largely reported and disseminated via blog. Which is not surprising, when you consider the sheer number of African and world bloggers who attended -- and how powerful their blogs have been in sharing ideas of the new Africa.

For those following the conference from home, it's clear that the blog coverage of TEDGlobal has the power to provoke emotion, passion and the desire to make change.

Ethan Zuckerman -- in a post-TED post that is a must-read for anyone thinking about Africa -- reports:

I got an IM from a friend in the States today who told me she’d found the ideas expressed at TED - which she followed through the blogs - inspiring, filling her with hope. I hope that reaction is widespread. ...

Home viewer beninmwangi makes the point on his MySpace blog:

... if you have not already guessed it, I am truly inspired, but as a blogger what inspires me the most is how the bloggers in attendance have taken the stage from the usual suspects -- the conventional media.

The African Uptimist writes:

Jennifer Brea ... made my day with her post "Writing a new story about Africa," in which she invites the reader to "imagine four days where you only use the good words to talk about Africa: words of forward motion, words of change...[four days of hearing] from the mouths of people who are out there living it, building it, succeeding (and quite possibly getting very rich) in Africa." I think it is safe to say that TED Global Conference 2007 was special in that it marked a turning point towards the 're-branding' of Africa.

Other blogs, including smallSHIFT, nobaddays and Magaidi, also shared their excitement over the ideas coming out of the conference via bloggers such as Ethan Zuckerman, Erik Hersman of AfriGadget and White African, and David McQueen (who notes "Well my blog has never been so popular. I must go away some more and write like nuts"). You can see the full list of bloggers here.

Thank you to BijanBlog for a nice compliment on our coverage here at the TEDBlog -- and for pointing out the connection between TEDGlobal's blog coverage and the Bob Thurman talk we posted this week on TED.com:

A few days ago, TEDBlog posted an earlier video of Bob Thurman's talk (taken on 12/06) about ... an all-connected world:
"When we can know everything, we can see how everything is interconnected -- and we can begin to feel compassion for every living being."
Wow.

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