http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqTwYa46OKE It’s alive. The new Apple iPad ad, titled “Alive,” debuted last night and features a gorgeous glimpse of the recently updated TED mobile app. The spot also highlights TED speaker Mathieu Lehanneur, a designer who looks to science and nature for inspiration for problem-solving objects. Lehanneur is the man behind the living air purifier […]
TED playlists are collections of talks around a topic, built for you in a thoughtful sequence to illuminate ideas in context. This weekend, three new playlists are available: “Ancient clues,” “Planes, trains and automobiles” and “Are we alone in the universe?” Ancient clues Five fascinating talks by archaeologists and evolutionary biologists about humanity’s beginnings and […]
Welcome our new Ideas Editor, Helen Walters. We’re excited to have her around all the time; she’s been writing for TED.com, off and on, since 2007. Last year she was part of our marathon, can’t-stop-won’t-stop coverage of TED2012 and TEDGlobal 2012, where she wrote, in four days, 39,000 words. She’s nuts. Formerly the editor of innovation […]
Young-ha Kim has a simple message for us all: get out there and create some art. Are you getting tense, just from the suggestion? In today’s talk, given at TEDxSeoul and TED’s first ever in Korean, Kim says, “You think, ‘I’m too busy. I don’t have time for art.’ There are hundreds of reasons why […]
Here, some staff picks of smart, funny, bizarre and cool stuff on the interwebs this week, with a light Valentine’s Day theme: Suleika Jaouad, who writes about being young with cancer, talks about the embarrassing but very real prospect of being a sexually active cancer patient. [The NYTimes Well Blog] For other unconventional responses to […]
Esther Perel begins today’s talk with an intriguing question: “Why does good sex so often fade even for couples who continue to love each other as much as ever?” It’s a question that’s highly appropriate to think about on Valentine’s Day. Perel, the author of the book Mating in Captivity, offers a compelling theory for […]
Few people know more about online dating that Christian Rudder, co-founder and editorial director of OKCupid. Privy to the vast mountains of data created as millions of people answer questions about what they’re looking for in love, search through profiles of people in their area and flirtatiously message each other, Rudder has learned a lot […]
Math class should be fascinating, right? At TED2010, Conrad Wolfram suggests that one reason it often isn’t is hand calculation. Most students spend years in math class learning to work sums by hand that a computer can now do. After all, computers are far better at calculation than human beings will ever be, while people […]
Occupy Wall Street’s slogan “We are the 99%” had been echoing through the United States and the world for just over a month when James B. Glattfelder and his co-authors released the study “The Network of Global Corporate Control” in October 2011. The study was a scientific look at our global economy, revealing how control […]
President Barack Obama ended his 2013 State of the Union address just minutes ago saying, “We are citizens. It’s a word that doesn’t just describe our nationality or legal status. It describes the way we’re made … Well into our third century as a nation, it remains the task of us all, as citizens of these United […]
Roads need constant repair. Rain, snow and other moisture seeps into the asphalt and — if it freezes — expands, breaking it apart and creating potholes. In today’s talk, given at TEDxDelft, civil engineer Erik Schlangen reveals a fascinating solution: a road that is able to heal. He gives a demonstration of a new type […]
The day was February 12, 1809. The place was Shrewsbury, England. The person born there: Charles Darwin. With the publication of his classic, On the Origins of Species, Darwin set the wheels in motion for a dramatic transformation of the way human beings understand the world and how we came to exist in it . […]
TED is ready to learn every word to “O Canada.” For TED2014 — our 30th anniversary spectacular themed “The Next Chapter” — we are moving our annual West Coast conference to Vancouver, Canada. There, we’ll enjoy sweeping views of the harbor and North Shore Mountains, a theater custom-built to maximize the impact of talks and […]
From age 6 through age 11, Shabana Basij-Rasikh risked her life to go to school. The Taliban had banned girls in Afghanistan from studying at universities and other educational institutions and, thus, Basij-Rasikh dressed as a boy, posing as an escort for her older sister. Together, the two would place their books in grocery bags […]
The 2013 Grammy Awards, which aired last night, offered up many a surprise with indie-tinged acts grabbing major awards over more established contenders. British folk-rockers Mumford & Sons (above) won the award for Album of the Year for Babel while electronic master Gotye took home Record of the Year for his infectious song “Somebody That […]
TED playlists are collections of talks around a topic, built for you in a thoughtful sequence to illuminate ideas in context. This weekend, two new playlists are available: “Design of useful things” and “Maestros, if you please … !” Maestros, if you please … ! These 7 extraordinary maestros bring you into the world of […]