Here onstage at TED2018, futurist Ray Kurzweil has just formally announced a new way to query the text inside books using something called semantic search — which is a search on ideas and concepts, rather than specific words. Called TalkToBooks, the beta-stage product uses an experimental AI to query a database of 120,000 books in […]
TED fans with an Android TV or Amazon FireTV will see a newly reimagined app — one that offers far more than just a sleek new design — beginning today. We’re giving you more relevant talk suggestions, provided daily on the homepage. With our new layout, the app’s playlists and talks are easier than ever to […]
Now we’ve completely rebuilt the TED Talks Android app to help our global audience search, find and watch talks in their local languages. The rebuilt-from-the-ground-up Android app works natively in 24 languages, so if your phone setting is in native Japanese, you’ll now get the full TED experience with a Japanese interface and more than 2,000 TED Talks subtitled in Japanese — and even multi-language search.
When James Kennicott, now 86, was young, he loved ice-skating on the river near his home in Waterloo, Iowa. One day, the ice cracked under his feet and he plunged into the water below. He didn’t have hot water at home. So he broke into his school to take a hot shower. “I think that […]
Before Danielle Thomson was our TED Prize researcher, she wrote trivia for Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? and spent years finding difficult-to-source info for The Late Show with David Letterman. And she has quickly established herself as our staff secret weapon. When one of us can’t get our hands on a piece of information […]
Several members of the TED community are popping in the news this week. Below, some highlights: Dan Berkenstock’s Skybox Imaging, which uses small satellites to create close to real-time imagery of the planet, has been bought by Google. The internet giant’s website explains, “Skybox’s satellites will help keep our maps accurate with up-to-date imagery. Over […]
Cartoonist (and former NASA roboticist) Randall Munroe illustrates the questions that keep you (or at least him) up at night. Whether that’s “What would happen if you tried to hit a baseball pitched at 90% the speed of light?” or “How much of the Earth’s currently-existing water has ever been turned into a soft drink […]
The illustrious questioner Charlie Rose and Google cofounder and CEO Larry Page take their seats on the TED stage for a Q&A during Session 6: Wired. They talk about Page’s latest projects, Snowden’s appearance and the underlying ethos that powers Page’s work. Below is an edited version of their conversation. Charlie Rose: Where is Google, […]
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpOjnXcy8NE&w=586&h=330] During the Oscars, I got teary at three things: Lupita Nyong’o’s acceptance speech, the “In memoriam” montage and Google’s filmmaking-themed ad that ran toward the end of the night. This ad, titled “We’re all Storytellers,” showed young filmmakers experimenting with their craft and , on a night all about the power of film, it […]
In his TED talk, Sergey Brin of Google shares the idea that motivated the development of Google Glass: that while smartphones inherently take us away from experiencing the real world, a device could allow for a digitally-mediated experience within it. “This position you just saw me in – looking down at my phone – that’s one of […]
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 […]
Google cofounder Sergey Brin returns to the TED stage this morning to show off Google Glass, a hands-free, voice-activated augmented-reality headset from Google. To take a picture while you’re wearing Glass, say “take picture.” Done. “When we started Google 15 years ago,” Brin says, “my vision was that information would come to you as you […]
Where some people saw a social network too far, Daria Musk saw an opportunity. In the summer of 2011, she joined Google+ and decided to perform a live concert via its video chat feature, Hangouts. Her concerts can last up to eight hours, and in just a few months she turned from a self-described lonely […]
Hans Rosling writes: So it did happen! Just hours ago World Bank president did completely change the World Bank data policy. This story shows the power of Ideas worth spreading. The story runs in 5 acts: 1. My TED2006 talk yielded Google’s acquisition of software from Gapminder. 2. Tim Berners-Lee add pressure for free data […]
Your humble TED bloggers were deep into TED2009 prep when this demo dropped last week — so let’s catch up. Watch Sylvia Earle, a winner of the 2009 TED Prize, as she narrates this demo of Google Ocean, an extension of Google Earth:
In a follow-up to his now-legendary TED2006 presentation, Hans Rosling demonstrates how developing countries are pulling themselves out of poverty. He shows us the next generation of his Trendalyzer software — which analyzes and displays data in amazingly accessible ways, allowing people to see patterns previously hidden behind mountains of stats. (Just days after this […]