Stories for "TED Books"
Are your endless tweets, status updates and Instagrams robbing you of enjoying what’s special about the moments you’re trying to share? Damon Brown fears they may. In the TED Book Our Virtual Shadow: Why We Are Obsessed With Documenting Our Lives Online, he lays out a compelling case for mindfully balancing your online presence with being present in […]
At concerts, lighters once swayed in the air during poignant moments, the audience belting out lyrics together in a moment of catharsis. Today, the group sing-alongs still happen, but the air shines with a different glow: the light of cell phones. Last week, while seeing a favorite band, I couldn’t help but notice the sea […]
By Damon Brown The morning of our wedding, my wife and I only had one major discussion: Should we bring our cell phones? She loved Facebook as much as I loved Twitter, and since we’ve lived and made friends all across the country, the social networks made it easier to stay connected to our loved […]
When it comes to US politics, many are frustrated that gridlock and grandstanding so often substitute for the hard job of getting things done. Just 14% of Americans say they approve of the work that Congress is doing, according to a recent Gallup poll. (Which, as a recent TED speaker notes, is lower than the […]
This week, protestors in San Francisco called on President Obama to block the construction of the Keystone XL pipeline, which has been proposed to transport oil the 1700 miles from Canada to the Texas Gulf Coast. Advocates of the pipeline believe that it’s the holy-grail project that will create jobs for Americans, make us more […]
Before we can tackle climate change, financial reform, education reform or, well, anything, there is a single issue that we in the United States must confront. As legal activist Lawrence Lessig says in today’s talk, before we can bring about change on any of the thousands of issues that matter to us, we must change […]
The proposed Keystone XL pipeline would stretch 1,700 miles from Western Canada to the Gulf Coast of Texas. And it has become a touchstone for the bitter fight over America’s energy future. Opponents say the pipeline — designed to bring oil from Canadian tar sands down through the United States — would further bind future […]
How would it feel to walk across a sunny meadow, through a quiet forest, or up a beautiful ridge, knowing all the while there might be active land mines just beneath your feet? In Minescape: Waging War Against Land Mines, Brett Van Ort—artist and photojournalist—shares photographs that document just this experience. Through his pastoral, haunting […]
Long after a war is over, land mines continue to maim and kill. In Minescape: Waging War Against Land Mines, artist and photojournalist Brett Van Ort shares a collection of photographs documenting the tragic and unforeseen consequences of leftover land mines from the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Through unsettling photographs of deceptively innocent landscapes, descriptions […]
Imagine a city skyline — a jagged line of peaks, drops and plateaus — all filled with rooftop farms. This is the dream of Roman Gaus, CEO of UrbanFarmers, which aims to turn city roof space into a place to grow fresh food and even raise fish. Gaus has contributed an essay to the new […]
Do city people really like to share more? Emily Badger of The Atlantic Cities suggests a new and fascinating phenomenon in urban areas — that city dwellers are moving toward a culture of shared ownership of everything from cars to power tools. Badger shares this thought in an essay from the new TED Book City […]
In the 1950s, 3 out of every 10 people on the planet lived in a city. Today, that ratio has nearly doubled — and the United Nations projects that by 2050, nearly 7 in 10 people will live in urban settings. Our population is gravitating towards cities, and this shift is creating amazing opportunities as […]
The world’s cities are on pace to balloon from 3.6 billion inhabitants today to more than 6 billion by midcentury. As a result, we face both a dire emergency and a tremendous opportunity. At their best, our modern cities are hubs of human connection, fountains of creativity and exemplars of green living. Yet at the […]
If you could ask a stranger any question, what would it be? This is the question Davy Rothbart set out to answer when he embarked on a nationwide tour to celebrate the 10th anniversary of his magazine, Found. Rothbart — a writer, reporter and documentary filmmaker known for his curiosity about other people’s lives — […]
Who hasn’t found themselves at party, standing awkwardly by the guacamole, approximately five feet from another person doing the same? Sometimes it’s just hard to know what to say to start a conversation. Davy Rothbart can help. In his new TED Book, How Did You End Up Here?: The Surprising Ways Our Questions Connect Us, Rothbart […]
The asocial side of social media: TED Book author Damon Brown on our “virtual shadows”
