Escape Artists

The Lounge at the End of the Universe => Gallimaufry => Topic started by: wakela on March 04, 2010, 11:32:09 PM

Title: TED talks
Post by: wakela on March 04, 2010, 11:32:09 PM
If you are not listening or watching TED talks you need to start immediately.  Each one is about 20 minutes, and of the half-dozen I've listened to, I learned something new and inspiring from almost each one. 

TED stands for Technology Entertainment Design.  So you get talks from artists, nutritionists, lawyers, psychologists, computer scientists, etc.  Big cheeses like Bill Gates and Al Gore have done them.  You can subscribe to their podcast and/or their Youtube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/TEDtalksDirector).

I don't work of them or anything, I've just been blown away by the high quality of the talks I've heard, and I think you guys would be too. 
Title: Re: TED talks
Post by: Boggled Coriander on March 05, 2010, 04:09:50 AM
What wakela said. 

Don't have much to add, really, except that some are considerably shorter than 20 minutes - some are 5-6 minutes long, the average is probably 15 min or so, and 22 min is the longest they ever stretch to.  (The TED site links to some outside talks that occasionally run much longer than that, but they're the exception, not the rule.)

And they cover all sorts of topics.
Title: Re: TED talks
Post by: Scattercat on March 05, 2010, 05:04:52 AM
TED talks are pretty much uniformly awesome.
Title: Re: TED talks
Post by: Planish on March 13, 2010, 04:37:37 AM
Yes, awesome.

The last one I watched was with Dutch artist Theo Jansen and his kinetic sculptures that have a weird sort of mechanical intelligence. - http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/theo_jansen_creates_new_creatures.html - Kind of a Gilligan's Island-tech robot?

Before that was Pattie Maes demos the Sixth Sense (http://blog.ted.com/2009/03/sixth_sense_demo.php)
Title: Re: TED talks
Post by: Bdoomed on March 25, 2010, 07:16:29 AM
oh  man, http://www.ted.com/talks/lennart_green_does_close_up_card_magic.html
I was cracking up.

oh and by the way I saw the Sixth Sense demo vid a while ago, so awesome.
Title: Re: TED talks
Post by: lowky on March 25, 2010, 12:15:18 PM
Not TED talks but free online courses through cosmolearning http://www.cosmolearning.com/ (http://www.cosmolearning.com/)