Armed with a good idea, some scrap metal, and plenty of determination, Alex Odira Odundo invented two low-cost machines that make it easy to process fibers from the drought-tolerant sisal plant – promoting stable incomes and improving lives in his subsistence farming community. How did you come to invent the Sisal Decorticator and Sisal Twinner? […]
[ted id=1390] Were you intrigued by “The $8 Billion iPod,” Rob Reid’s short TEDTalk about the new science of Copyright Math (TM)? We were. We needed to know more. More numbers, Rob! we said. And Rob (whose comic novel Year Zero comes out in July) sent us this treatise, a master class in creative mathematics: […]
Are we alone? It’s a question with which we are all familiar. Jill Tarter says she started asking it “as a little girl, walking along the deserted and dark beaches of Manasota Key, Florida, holding on to my father’s hand.” She went on to advanced studies in engineering, physics and astrophysics, to pursue a career […]
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7SWvDHvWXok&hd=1&w=560&h=315%5D This video comes from our new TED-Ed channel on YouTube. Now available as a full-length version (12 minutes): TED Curator Chris Anderson shares his obsession with questions that no one (yet) knows the answers to. An introduction leads into two big questions that Anderson (and all of us) pondered as a kid and […]
At the end of 2010, a researcher named Brené Brown gave a talk at her local TEDx event, TEDxHouston. That talk, “The Power of Vulnerability,” has since become a web-video phenomenon — viewed and shared by millions of people, who write us to say that her words — on shame, vulnerability and honesty — moved […]
Musician, ethnomusicologist, author, and social media maven — Kyra Gaunt (see her TEDxChisinau talk here) won’t limit herself to one way of thinking. Using a variety of media, she works nonstop to help humanity see our own remarkable unity in diversity. Your work encompasses scholarship, musical performance, educational theory, race, gender, and more. How do […]
All photos by James Duncan Davidson, who writes: In the lower right photograph, there are twelve 12TB Pegasus R6 arrays. That’s 144TB total. It’s a tenth of a freaking petabyte of usable space. Backstory: During a TED conference, we create a lot of data — five days of high-res video from nine cameras, tens of […]
Socio-environmental artist Colleen Flanigan creates large, undulating metal forms and installs them in damaged coral ecosystems to help regenerate marine life — living sea sculptures that inspire awe and protection for our underwater world. What is the coral crisis about? We are at a critical stage in coral endangerment. Some predict that most corals will […]
[vimeo=http://vimeo.com/37882880] On Vimeo, John Giannakos shares this fun recap of the Coffee Common experience at TED2012, backstage, behind the bar and relaxing after crazy long days. (Jump to Vimeo for a list of every barista.) And see Coffee Common’s gorgeous photos on Flickr >> Photo: Brian W. Jones / Coffee Common
Mike’s Picks: Our photo editor, Mike Femia, is sorting through tens of thousands of photos this week. He picks a favorite each day. Here’s today’s: I was blown away by the energy of the Mama Foundation Gospel for Teens. Photo: James Duncan Davidson
Three weeks ago, the first democratically elected president of the island nation of the Maldives, Mohamed Nasheed, was ousted in a coup that brought back to power supporters of the past regime. One of the TED’s curators, Bruno Giussani, had been in discussion with Nasheed and his entourage about a possible talk on climate change […]
Mike’s Picks: Our photo editor, Mike Femia, is sorting through thousands of photos this week. He picks a favorite each day. Here’s today’s: A beautiful photo by Ryan Lash of the truly amazing Reggie Watts onstage at TED2012. My happiness increases by 10x every time I look at it.
Photo: TEDActive 2012. Feb. 27-March 2, 2012 Palm Springs, CA. Marla Aufmuth / TED A day of stories, passion and etymologies led by TED’s volunteer translation community made for an exciting start to TEDActive 2012. Last Sunday, the Open Translation Project held its second workshop in Palm Springs, California, where translators discussed the joys and […]
Mike’s Picks: Our photo editor, Mike Femia, is sorting through thousands of photos this week. He picks a favorite each day. Here’s today’s: Late on Monday night, Duncan Davidson captured this stunning explosion of movement and light during Quixotic rehearsals.
This morning onstage, Gary Kovacs of Mozilla announced a fascinating browser add-on for Mozilla: Lightbeam. (Watch his TEDTalk.) It allows you to track who’s tracking you online … and the results are surprising, to say the least. In summer of 2011, we stumbled onto an early version of the add-on, then called Collusion. How did we […]
The 10 final selections of the second TED Ads Worth Spreading initiative were announced from the TED stage only moments ago, and we’re excited to share the results. The winners are a truly diverse group, representing the best of the categories Brand Bravery, Creative Wonder, Social Good, Cultural Compass, Talk and Storytelling. Entries and nominations […]