05 May 2008

Maira Kalman on Alvar Aalto, in T Magazine

A lovely moment in the latest T Magazine, in this Sunday's New York Times: Maira Kalman writes about and illustrates her classic Alvar Aalto vase.

Read the full story >>

Posted by TED Staff | Permalink

Permalink | Comments () | TrackBack (0)

29 September 2007

TED Salon: Further reading

Some selected source material and references from Wednesday night's TED Salon:

David Keith (pictured, left) showed a New York Times editorial on the coming climate change -- from May 24, 1953:

How Industry May Change Climate
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air will double by the year 2080 and raise the temperature an average of at least 4 per cent. The burning of about two billion tons of coal and oil a year keeps the average ground temperature somewhat higher than it would otherwise be. ...

Within the NYTimes archive, we found a related story from 1953:

The Weather Is Really Changing
Studies confirm that feeling you've had that summers are getting warmer. So are our winters. But atmosphere, not atoms, is to blame.

A few other historical sources Keith referred to:
+ Changing Climate, by the Carbon Dioxide Assessment Committee, U.S. National Research Council, 1983
+ Restoring the Quality of Our Environment, Report of the Environmental Pollution Panel, President’s Science Advisory Committee, The White House, December 1965

Martin Hoffert discussed the Kardashev scale -- a ranking of civilizations based on the kinds of energy they use. Earth is still at the bottom of this scale -- we're just using whatever we find lying around on the planet. More advanced civilizations in the universe, Kardashev theorizes, will begin to harvest and grow power using all the resources of their star system and of the universe. Hoffert shows us one step toward star power: solar energy via satellite.

Juan Enriquez talked about two scientists whose work could point the way to a new future of energy. As an inspiration, he points to Norman Borlaug, called "the Father of the Green Revolution." Borlaug developed optimized strains of wheat that, quite literally, now feed the world. He brought a biological, a scientific approach to agriculture that allowed it to leap beyond the boundaries of traditional "brute force" farming -- to become efficient, dependable and more productive by orders of magnitude. Enriquez' next scientist-hero is Hamilton Smith, who shared the 1978 Nobel Prize in Medicine for his work in manipulating DNA. Is Smith, or someone like him, the person who will help energy make the great leap forward that farming has?

Photo of David Keith by Myrna Suarez, Condé Nast Portfolio

Posted by TED Staff | Permalink

Permalink | Comments () | TrackBack (0)

14 August 2007

A freak blog migrates into an institution

After over two years at freakonomics.com, Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner -- co-authors of the 3-million-copies "Freakonomics" -- last week moved their blog under a bigger and more institutional brand, that of the Opinion section of the New York Times' website.

Levitt spoke at TED2004 offering a preview of a chapter of "Freakonomics" titled "Why do crack dealers still live with their moms?" (watch the video) and exposing his very unconventional approach to economic analysis.

The migration of the blog wouldn't be a remarkable event (even though the blog is very interesting and highly interactive, attracting hundreds of readers' comments) were it not for two facts. The move, in a way, closes a circle: "Freakonomics" was born from a profile that Dubner wrote about Levitt for the New York Times Magazine in 2003, "The Economist of Odd Questions". It also underscores a nascent trend, that of well-known bloggers moving into newspapers' and magazines' websites, creating synergies and pooling readerships -- another step towards the hybridization of the media. The NYT is not the first to try this strategy: France's Le Monde, for example, has been doing so for a while.

Posted by Bruno Giussani | Permalink

Permalink | Comments () | TrackBack (0)

16 April 2007

New TED.com and TED's June Cohen featured in today's New York Times

Today's New York Times carries an article by E-Commerce reporter Bob Tedeschi about the new TED.com:

Hiroko Masuike for The New York Times

June Cohen, director of TED Media, said putting conference presentations on the Internet helped increase exposure.

By BOB TEDESCHI
Published: April 16, 2007
THOSE who don’t have $6,000 or enough prominent connections to get into a TED conference can take heart. The price of admission just went to zero, provided you can settle for a more remote experience.

The TED organization (TED stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design) runs an invitation-only conference in Monterey, Calif., every year for movers and shakers in business and nonprofit circles.

Yesterday, TED introduced a Web site that offers about 100 of its TED Talks, the polished 20-minute presentations for which the conference is renowned.

The new site will generate more advertising revenue for TED, but more important, conference leaders said, it will expose TED’s content to millions of people who would otherwise never attend the event.

In so doing, TED is at the vanguard of a trend in the conference industry, where organizers have begun to exploit assets that in years past evaporated as soon as speakers left the stage.

“I’m so struck by it anytime I’m at a great event,” said June Cohen, director of media for TED, a nonprofit business based in New York. “That was so wonderful, but now it’s gone. It’s a shame they’re not captured and preserved.”

Ms. Cohen said TED’s organizers began posting last June a handful of free videos from past conferences on TED.com, with “fairly aggressive goals for how I thought they’d do. But we blew past those pretty quickly.” By January, the number of TED Talks on the site had grown to 44, and they had been viewed more than three million times.

Article continues after the jump...

Posted by Tom Rielly | Permalink

Permalink | Comments () | TrackBack (0)