Salon.com > TED Conference

TED: Even more elitist than we thought

Fri, 18 May 2012 12:40:00 +0000

We've long heard complaints that TED is elitist. The annual conference in California costs $7,500 to attend and is nearly impossible to get into, even for those who can afford the price tag; it is widely considered to be "unofficially invite-only."

Still, you'd be hard pressed to find someone who hasn't gone down a TED video rabbit hole at least once. Snobby as they may be, those TED folks sure know how to pull together some fascinating speakers and share their talks online in a compelling way. There are some questionable TED talks in the archives, sure, but most of them are solid, and some are great (for example, the scientist who studied her own stroke).

Does the world need TEDWomen?

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 14:01:00 +0000

Salon editor-in-chief Joan Walsh is the first to admit, she's a bit envious of the luminaries who get invited to the annual TED conference, where the incredible, the famous, and the incredibly famous join to hear and present "ideas worth spreading." Since 1984, the event's organizers have drawn together stars from the worlds of academia, entertainment, technology and business -- plus the crowds willing to shell out $6,000 a pop to see them speak -- to convene, talk and hopefully forge change in the world.

So when Joan got an invitation to the newly minted TEDWomen, she wasn't sure whether to be flattered or insulted. Was this the real deal, or some kind of consolation prize? She knew TED's track record -- less than 20 percent of "TED talks," as conference presentations are known, have been given by women, and of the speakers at this year's conference, only 17 of 57 will be. Why create a new female-focused conference, Joan wondered, rather than just integrate more women into the program of TED itself?

Inside TED

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 17:19:00 +0000

A perfect breeze wafts through the outdoor plaza of the four-star Riviera Resort in Palm Springs, Calif., site of this year's TEDActive conference, the slightly less expensive, and less exclusive, overflow conference of the annual TED conference, held in Long Beach. Friend and colleague Andy Bichlbaum and I are sitting with a crowd in an outdoor Jacuzzi, reveling in the balmy weather after having just barely escaped the blizzard on the East Coast. This being a conference devoted to "Ideas worth spreading," we've been invited to give a talk here about the work of the mischief-making, left-leaning activist collective known as the Yes Men, best known for constructing elaborate pranks, impersonations and hacks of major corporations and powerful government bodies. Andy is one of the co-founders, and I've been working with the group on and off in various capacities for a year and change.

Feminists have no sense of humor

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 17:30:00 +0000

OK! We’ve covered the Polanski affair. (In fact, our own Kate Harding’s Broadsheet post won her kudos from Time for the “best, most comprehensive” rebuttal of Polanski apologists. Newsweek raved too.) Right, so now can we joke about it? Oh no wait, we can’t. Because as adorkable warbler Nellie McKay reminded us in a recentish appearance at a TED conference (more recently blogged by Dan Savage), “Feminists don't have a sense of humor.” (“Rape and degradation's just a crime (lighten up, ladies!)” and etc.) But no matter what the heinous news hook, in the words of our tipster: “Sarcasm + vintagey feminine appearance + ukelele = brilliant.” Enjoy.

Inspiration for 2008

Fri, 04 Jan 2008 21:55:00 +0000

In need of a little new year's inspiration? Broadsheet recommends novelist Isabel Allende's poignant and hilarious talk on passion, writing, beauty and feminism given in Monterey, Calif., at the TED conference last year in March. (It was just posted on the TED site in January 2008.)

It's moving to watch Allende exhort the elite audience of business movers and shakers to become champions for the poorest women in the world, and somehow she manages to make that message fun. Allende's delivery is priceless, so it's really worth catching the whole 18 minutes. But here's one highlight: "I was born in ancient times at the end of the world in a patriarchal, Catholic and conservative family. No wonder that by age five I was a raging feminist, although the term had not reached Chile yet, so nobody knew what the heck was wrong with me. I would soon find out that there was a high price to pay for my freedom and for questioning the patriarchy, but I was happy to pay it because for every blow that I received I was able to deliver two." See Allende deliver those blows here.

A step forward for the World Bank?

Fri, 05 Oct 2007 03:54:00 +0000

There can be no doubting the résumé of Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, named today by Robert Zoellick to a top position at the World Bank. A survivor of Nigeria's Biafran war, she made her way to the United States at age 18 and received degrees in economics from Harvard and MIT. A 21-year stint at the World Bank was followed by a stunning term as finance minister in Nigeria during the administration of Olesugun Obasanjo. Among her accomplishments, negotiating a debt relief deal, tackling corruption, and boosting the nation's cash reserves by billions of dollars.

Some enthusiasts pitched her as a replacement for Paul Wolfowitz. That didn't fly. But the Financial Times' Krishna Guha speculates that her appointment "is likely to be a popular choice with the bank’s staff and non-governmental organizations," and that it "will be viewed internally as a signal that Mr Zoellick wants to press for reform by enlisting the support of bank staff."