So, the quirky competition I launched last week relating to Pledgebank.com has a winner. It is TEDster Lucy Hooberman. She’s looking to re-ignite an idea that was floated at TED in February (literally… it came from the World-Changing Ideas Cruise). The idea is to set up a Global Mentoring Alliance… the sharing of knowledge from […]
Imogen ("Immi") made a splash at TED2004 as the female half of Frou Frou. Her new CD "Speak for Yourself" launched this week, the title being an apt description of how the CD was produced – she did the whole thing from her own studio, writing all the songs, and playing every instrument. The result […]
At TEDGlobal this summer, Jimmy Wales outlined his vision for Wikipedia, his online storehouse of knowledge, collaboratively written by unpaid volunteers worldwide. His goal: to provide everyone in the world access to a free encyclopedia. But not just through the web. Eventually, he told us, he’d like to create a print version, as well. He […]
Leave it to Mark Hurst to not only write an extraordinary buyer’s guide, but also provide a comprehensive theoretical framework for doing so. Mark (founder of Good Experience) is a long-time advocate of the user experience, broadly defined. And lately he’s been troubled by twin themes: complexity and choice. Complexity in consumer products (It’s a […]
The 2005 U.S. National Design Awards were announced last week, with several of our TED friends among them. Congratulations to Burt Rutan (Product design), Stefan Sagmeister (Communication design), and Eva Zeisel (lifetime achievement). Well done!
A special report from Forbes.com covers the broad topic of Communicating in some interesting ways: from the origins of language in chimps to alien contact to the latest computer interfaces (including the SUI, or Straw-like User Interface, which lets you experience the sensations of drinking). Many TED voices here (Steven Pinker, Jane Goodall, Ray Kurzweil, […]
Another intriguing post from our friends at Worldchanging.com…
Here’s a brilliant new website, pledgebank. The idea’s simple. Make a pledge, any pledge, conditional on a number of other people joining in. Pledges can be symmetrical (everyone does the same thing)… "I will march on the White House in protest at X, if 1,000 people will join me." "I will […]
Something truly significant is happening right now in the world of web creation. Engineers, entrepreneurs, and investors are buzzing with the possibilities of web 2.0 technologies, and the interactive applications they enable. There’s an energy — even a joyfulness — pervading the industry that this former web gal hasn’t seen since perhaps 1999. The web […]
Given that everyone’s top wish, politicians and bimbos alike, is supposed to be “world peace,” you’d think that when a detailed, intensely-researched, highly credible report is published suggesting spectacular progress in that direction, it would be front-page news in the media. You’d be wrong. The Human Security Report 2005 published last week included the following […]
TEDster Diego Rodriguez, who works with IDEO, teaches at the Stanford d. School, and writes the influential blog metacool, debuts his BusinessWeek Online column today. We’ll be watching that space …
A great piece in BusinessWeek Online suggests that TED Prize winner Cameron Sinclair and his work with Architecture for Humanity could be the silver lining to this year of natural catastrophes…
Many TEDsters have their own blogs, and one of the coolest is Steve Jurvetson’s. Steve (pictured here test-driving Graham Hawkes’ gorgeous Deep Flight Aviator) is currently in China, and I followed a discussion on his ‘BMW style‘ Chinese SUVs to this not-very-confidence-inspiring crash-test video. Perhaps Detroit still has a few years to run… Check out […]
Whether you’re surveying a new season of design offerings, or simply considering a new set of spoons, you might find yourself wondering: WWMMD? What would Murray Moss Do? Moss (TED2002) curates one of the world’s great collections of inspired objets in his eponymous SoHo store. You’ll get a sense of where he’s heading from this […]
Got MUJI? If not, you will soon. The opening last week of a MUJI store-within-a-store at the Museum of Modern Art was a great day for great design. Discerning design geeks already adore MUJI, the “brand-free” Japanese brand that creates elegant, streamlined, delightfully practical products, ranging from scissors to CD players to concept cars. Their […]
Here’s a quirky line-up of "the world’s top 20 public intellectuals" published by a couple of magazines after a widely-promoted internet vote. 1 Noam Chomsky 2 Umberto Eco 3 Richard Dawkins 4 Václav Havel 5 Christopher Hitchens 6 Paul Krugman 7 Jürgen Habermas 8 Amartya Sen 9 Jared Diamond 10 Salman Rushdie 11 Naomi Klein […]