TED (conference) 

TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is an annual conference that defines its mission as "ideas worth spreading". The lectures, also called TED talks, cover a broad set of topics including science, arts and design, politics, culture, business, global issues, technology and development, and entertainment. Speakers come from a similarly wide variety of communities and disciplines1 and have included such people as former U.S. president Bill Clinton,2 Nobel laureates James D. Watson 3, Murray Gell-Mann,4 Al Gore, internet entrepreneur Jimmy Wales,5 notable architect and urbanism critic James Howard Kunstler,6 and Google co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page.7

The TED staff is headquartered in New York City and Vancouver, Canada. The conference has been held in Monterey, California, since its founding, but as of 2009 will be held in Long Beach, California.8 The TED conference also has a companion conference, TED Global, held in varying locations.

Over 300 TED talks are provided for free viewing online. As of June 2008, talks were viewed over 50 million times by more than 15 million people.910

Contents

History

TED was founded by Richard Saul Wurman and Harry Marks in 1984, and has been held annually since 1990. Wurman left after the 2002 conference; the event is now hosted by Chris Anderson and owned by his non-profit organization The Sapling Foundation,11 devoted to "leveraging the power of ideas to change the world". In 2006, attendance cost $4,400 and was by invitation only.12 The membership model was shifted in January of 2007 to an annual membership fee of $6,000, which includes attendance of the conference, club mailings, networking tools and conference DVDs.

Since 2007, TED Talks have been made available in an increasing number of locations including:13

TED Prize

The TED Prize was introduced in 2005. Each year, three individuals are each given $100,000 and granted a "wish to change the world", which they unveil at TED.

2005 15 2006 16 2007 17 2008 18 2009 19
Bono Dr. Larry Brilliant Bill Clinton Neil Turok Sylvia Earle
Edward Burtynsky Jehane Noujaim Edward O. Wilson Dave Eggers Jill Tarter
Robert Fischell Cameron Sinclair James Nachtwey Karen Armstrong José Antonio Abreu
Notes

See also

External links

Sister project Wikimedia Commons has media related to: TED

References

  1. ^ TED: Speakers
  2. ^ TED | Speakers | Bill Clinton
  3. ^ TED Speakers James Watson: Biologist, Nobel laureate
  4. ^ TED Speakers Murray Gell-Mann: Physicist, Nobel laureate
  5. ^ TED Speakers Jimmy Wales: Founder of Wikipedia
  6. ^ YouTube: James Howard Kunstler: The tragedy of suburbia
  7. ^ Speakers Sergey Brin and Larry Page: Co-founders of Google
  8. ^ Kim, Victoria (2008-01-16). "Long Beach to host influential TED conference", Los Angeles Times. Retrieved on 1 December 2008. 
  9. ^ Walters, Helen (2008-02-27). "Tapping Into TED", Business Week. Retrieved on 1 December 2008. 
  10. ^ 50 million TEDTalks viewed on TEDBlog
  11. ^ About TED - The Sapling Foundation
  12. ^ About the Conferences > Getting Invited (attendees)
  13. ^ Wired: Conference to Tackle Origins of Evil, Theories of Everything
  14. ^ The New York Times: Giving Away Information, but Increasing Revenue
  15. ^ "TED Prize 2005". TEDPrize.org. Retrieved on 2008-11-30.
  16. ^ "TED Prize 2006". TEDPrize.org. Retrieved on 2008-11-30.
  17. ^ "TED Prize 2007". TEDPrize.org. Retrieved on 2008-11-30.
  18. ^ "TED Prize 2008". TEDPrize.org. Retrieved on 2008-11-30.
  19. ^ "TED Prize 2009". TEDPrize.org. Retrieved on 2008-11-30.