Anas Aremeyaw Anas is known for, as he calls it, the “naming, shaming and jailing” of criminals all over Ghana – yet few people would be able to pick him out of a crowd. The undercover journalist, who gave today’s talk, has brought smugglers, mob bosses and pimps to justice with an unshakeable determination to, […]
“For the past five years we’ve been running the largest behavioral science experiment in the world,” says Alex Laskey in today’s TED Talk, given at this year’s 2013 conference in Long Beach. “And, it’s working.” Laskey’s company Opower partners with utility companies to deliver personalized home energy reports, all based off the insight that people are […]
The average person takes about 150 million steps in a lifetime. What if we could turn all that movement into energy? Two innovators are working on it — including a TED@London speaker. While one has built a system to capture the energy of foot traffic, the other is harnessing the power of smooth dance moves. […]
This morning’s TED Talk from Andrew Solomon asks a deep question about parents and children. Inspired by his own upbringing, Solomon wondered how parents form bonds with extraordinary children — or, in his words, when the “vertical culture” passed from parent to child is different from the “horizontal culture” of the child’s own self-identity. As […]
Check this out: a rather cool visualization of a TED Talk, courtesy of the Brazilian culture and science magazine Superinteressante. Each month, the magazine’s editors will take one of TED’s talks and give it to their graphic wizards to interpret in any way they see fit, adding a visual design element to presentations that have […]
Anyone who lives in a major city, where pollen-thick summer air seems incompatible with the dearth of trees, it can be easy to forget the fact that plants make the world go round. Here to remind you is a playlist of 10 TED Talks on the majesty and awesomeness of plants. Hear from not one […]
A heads-up, if you happen to be near Rotterdam, in the Netherlands — ornithologist Kees Moeliker (watch his TED Talk) and friends will be celebrating the annual Dead Duck Day on June 5, at 17:55, on the lawn outside the glass-enclosed wing of Rotterdam’s Natural History Museum. Attendance is free. At this year’s event, Moeliker will […]
A few fun links from this week’s Internet, so you don’t get bogged down with all that summer reading you’re about to do » [Video] A Numberphile video explains a recent breakthrough by a relatively unknown mathematician, on pairs of prime numbers that differ by two. [YouTube] A beautiful meditation on the reality of dreams […]
Anita Doron’s first feature film, The Lesser Blessed, is a love story that takes place in a remote community in the Northwest Territories. This moving film is being released theatrically in Canada today, and will arrive in the U.S. on June 13th. As it opens, we asked Doron to tell us about the film, her path from poet […]
Sequencing an extinct genome is no longer a pipe dream, says evolutionary biologist and ancient DNA specialist Hendrik Poinar in today’s talk. It’s a modern reality, and we’re not too far from seeing a revived extinct species walking the Earth again — maybe even a woolly mammoth. In this talk from TEDxDeExtinction, Poinar talks about how […]
In this super cool talk from TEDxTokyo, magician Kohtaro Fujiyama morphs ripped pieces of paper into butterflies, and then lets them take flight, controlling their motion by waving fans. (Fast forward to 1:43 to watch.) This fascinating display is an adaptation of tezuma, a classic form of Edo magic that fuses illusion, story and music. […]
The $1 million TED Prize is a way for a passionate, motivated dreamer to put a world-changing plan into action. With nominations for the prize open through June 16, so many great ideas are circulating around the TED community — and one of them could become the 2014 winner. We want you — yes, you […]
Why is it that, when we talk about sexual violence and domestic abuse, we talk about the women involved and erase the men from the conversation?In his TED talk, violence-prevention educator Jackson Katz explains why sentences like “Mary is a battered woman” are far more common than ones like “John beat Mary.” The takeaway of Katz’s […]
Paola Antonelli is senior curator of architecture and design at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. But despite her nearly 20-year tenure at the museum, Antonelli remains resolutely disinterested in relying on the known or the obviously popular. She is always keen to challenge preconceptions of design’s role in everyday life, even as […]
Happy Tuesday! Enjoy a bonus binge this week: a playlist about design. “Design giants” contains 13 talks by iconic modern designers. Hear from Philippe Starck, who asks, “Why design?” … Stefan Sagmeister on how design helped him find happiness … Eames Demetrios on his grandparents’ legendary work … and today’s talk, Paola Antonelli, on how […]
Watching curator Chris Anderson in speaker rehearsals before a TED conference feels like witnessing the zen of a longtime coach who knows his sport both inside out and backwards. Whenever a trial run of a talk feels just a little askew, a few simple sentences are whispered. Magically, the next time the talk is given […]