Conferenza

TED2008 - RSW returns to the TEDstage!

Richard Saul Wurman has just been invited to the stage for a conversation with Chris Anderson...a remarkable TED moment. Surrounded by a Sputnik satellite, Guttenberg Bible and other artifacts from Jay Walker's library, RSW, or Ricky as he's known to many long-time TEDsters, began with some tears, then described how marvelous it was to take the stage as part of a session dubbed "is Beauty Truth?"

RSW's return was particularly poignant as he and TED curator Chris Anderson had participated in some bitter feuding over the conference for more than half a decade after Anderson acquired it from its creator - a feud RSW announced had recently and finally ended - and also because Anderson has announced he's pulling TED out of Monterey next year, determining the ever-growing audience to have outgrown the facility here.

"It is true we've had an acrimonious relationship the last four to five years, and we don't now, and that's beautiful" Richard Saul Wurman said.

RSW has often described the TED conference, which he began in 1984, as "the ultimate dinner party" he always had wanted to have... and while he and three others in the audience were there at that first TED, it has created a huge following and inspired both a year-long community of attendees and a slew of TED "Wannabe" conferences.

Richard said he had realized much of the period of acrimony resulted from misunderstanding, and he only recently came to learn how may attendees had come to believe that TED had changed their lives (for the better!). Many had attested to Richard that TED had given them license to engage in wondrous new undertakings in their lives.

In the meantime, RSW had launched a one-time rival, called eG, the entertainment gathering, in the Los Angeles area. MIT's Michael Hawley revived in a second edition of eG last December, and now promises to make it an annual event.

The TED conference is now doing some collaboration with eG, and is expected to distribute some of the eG presentations as part of its "TEDtalks" offering of past conference presentations.

Adobe - Illustrator and Photoshop and Acrobat were all announced from this stage, as was (Sun Microsystems Inc.'s) Java (programming language), even before it had a name, RSW recalled.

"This is the best conference that every happened, and the clones are nothing... well the clones, they are interesting, too, and they give people license to do other things..." he said.

Anderson and Wurman embraced, and said they were collaborating to create the 25th anniversary conference next year, which will be staged at a larger theater in Long Beach, California, under the theme "The Great Unveiling".

"The picture has already been taken," said Chris, at Wednesday night's opening gala, when your co-respondent commented this was a picture that needed to be made! Nonetheless, they were willing to mug again, and RSW could be heard praising the excellence of what he'd witnessed at the opening sessions - welcome words not only to Chris Anderson, but to all tedsters, young and old.

TED2008: TEDprizes to stream Live amid BIG Questions...

Our hosts at TED, which is taking place at its traditional home of Monterey, California, for what may be its last time here, have announced as excerpted below they will be streaming live Thursday the winners of the TED prizes for 2008 as they outline the wishes they want the TED community to help fulfill.

Quick note to the TED Community at large:

There's a huge sense of anticipation in Monterey and Aspen as TED2008 opens today. With 50 main speakers and another 50 shorter talks and performances, there's a real feast in store. For those of you who can't be here, here's how you can enjoy TED from afar.

First and foremost, we are opening up one complete session of TED free to the world, streamed live over the web. It's the dramatic session tomorrow evening when three remarkable individuals each unveil their TED Prize wish. ("One wish to change the world. No restrictions. Think big. Be creative.")

I invite you to join a global audience as Dave Eggers, Neil Turok and Karen Armstrong share their inspiring visions, followed by the uplifting music of Vusi Mahlasela.

You can see the live video feed here on Thursday, starting at 5.15pm US Pacific Time and lasting a couple of hours. You'll probably need a broadband connection to see the video properly. There's a button below the video to select a full-screen view.

Meanwhile you can keep up with the conference by checking in on the official TED blog, plus the brilliant blogs maintained by Ethan Zuckerman and our very own Bruno Giussani. We may have a few tasty surprises for you during the week.

You can also see a rapidly-growing gallery of pictures from the conference here. And Portfolio magazine has an impressive curtain-raiser on the conference here.

Best wishes from the all-abuzz TED Team.

TED2008 asks the BIG Questions?

The extravaganza which is TED began with a blast of Hamlet, out of the darkness on stage as delivered by Michael Stuhlbarg, a Tony award nominee actor of Shakespeare in the Park. Not just ANY soliloquy, of course... "To be or not to be."

This year's conference is about questions. BIG questions.

Chris Anderson, TED curator extraordinaire, then asks the audience to take a moment of silence to shift into the spirit of curiosity and intrigue and wit and soul-searching that is TED.

Minutes later, third generation paleoanthropoligist Louise Leakey is telling us "we're the only walking upright Ape that exists in the world today." Does that not seem to raise a big question? Well, consider this: many if not most species on the planet co-exist with many other related species, and in fact through three generations of research her family, as it happens, has demonstrated that there were multiple species of hominids at any one time, long ago in history.

Indeed, in 2001 Leaky and her mother, Meave, found a previously unknown hominid, 3.5 million year old Kenyan-thropus platyops at Lake Turkana in East Africa. This was found not far from where her grandparents, Louise and Mary Leaky discovered the bones of Homo habilis, one of at least three species who co-existed as recently as 90 generations ago - or roughly 1.8 million years.

That 2001 find, Leaky said, included "one of the most very special things you can do with your mother," as she showed the two of them brushing off the bones in making their discovery.

As much of the first session, there was plenty to entertain, shock and awe - including the actual human brain Harvard Neuroanatomist Jill Bolte Taylor shared from the stage, complete with spinal cord.

Near the end of the first session, "Who are we?" Anderson introduced astrophysicist Stephen Hawking, who made a presentation recorded a couple of hours previously from his home in Cambridge, England.

"We believe that life arose spontaneously on Earth," so it is naturally possible if not likely that it has arisen elsewhere in the universe. "Life appeared on earth within half a billion years of it being possible."

"We don't happen to have been visited by aliens...," he added, discounting observers of UFOs and the like as quacks. However, in answering Anderson, in a matter of seven minutes using his onscreen editing system,

"I think it quite likely we are the only civilization within several light years, otherwise we would have heard radio waves..."

But no one, including the marvelous and wide-ranging images of perennial TEDster and anthropologist Wade Davis or the nearly unfathonable graphics and factoids of artist Chris Jordan {we use 2 million plastic bottles every five minutes - do we?} could prepare anyone for the closing of Jill Bolte Taylor, as she described how she had been overtaken by a stroke on the morning of December 10, 1996.

The scientist described how she'd awakened with a throbbing sensation behind her eye akin in sharpness to eating a big bite of really cold ice cream, and that only after she'd worked out on an exercise machine and taken a shower did she realize the stroke was spreading.

At that moment, she had the actual forethought of mind [literally] to not only realize she was undergoing the stroke, at her home, but to ponder how rare it must be for a brain scientist to actually go through a stroke herself!

Then, no sooner had she thought that thought than "it crosses my mind that I'm a busy woman. I don't have time for a stroke."

She manages to reach a co-worker, after feeling an arm become paralyzed, and as she's being shifted from one Boston hospital to Mass General, she feels as a balloon letting out air that her energy was lifting from her body, and her spirit surrender.

"In that moment I knew that I was no longer the choreographer of my life," she said.

In vivid language, Taylor describes how she felt her spirit "like a great whale gliding through a sea of silent euphoria," surrendering to the notion either her physicians would save her, or not, and yet wondering if she would ever be able to fit that enormous feeling of euphoria back into her body.

Then, she enraptures the hall with the realization that she was indeed still alive, and the realization that though she could not at that time walk, read, speak properly or recall anything of her life, she would come to realize that since she was still alive, and could feel this nirvana, then logically others could do so.

Bolte Tayllor had described how the left brain is responsible for action and memory, while the right brain was the processor of the "here and now." Within her stroke-disabled body, she described feeling only a world of peaceful compassion in which she envisioned living people could control and dismiss left-brain calculations, to step to the right of their controlling left brain hemisphere to embrace a positive, humane world.

She described this particular stroke of insight into how we could lead our lives as what motivated her to recover...a process which took the work of eight long years to complete.

"Who are we? We are the light force power of the universe," she said, lauding the cognitive ability, humanity and manual dexterity she attributed to "50 trillion molecular geniuses" at work.

Little doubt, that was one of the grandest, most intense and most powerful beginnings of any TED conference, and, as Jill Bolte Taylor said of her own revelation, certainly worthy of TED's focus on "Ideas worth spreading."

EG'07 - Comic Interstitial Interludes

eg's team have picked out a hearty selection of interstitial segments, including the Sony Bravia color rabbit commercial (see also this one - and this), and a host of wonderful New Yorker cartoons distributed via Ringtones.

Enjoy.

EG'07 contretemps and nuggets

Many of the most poignant moments at the eg style of conference are what happens in the betwixt and between - realizing commonalities or contrasts often sparked by some comment, reference, gold nugget that's been uttered on stage.

This morning, for example, I began with a discussion on Libertarian solutions to cutting bureaucracy, and perhaps improving education, over morning coffee with Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Harvey Allison of Attractor, IDEO's Doug Solomon and Krisztina "Z" Holly, who runs the USC Stevens Institute for Innovation. One focus of discussion was Bezos' comment that the learning/feedback loop in education is long, and can impact a generation, though education overall is probably improving by more than schools are credited. He notes it took the Romans 80 years to realize linking acquaducts with lead was not a healthy innovation. While that may have been relatively fast, an education experiment that took as long to determine to have failed might be intolerable. Allison noted perceptible changes in schools are spread rapidly.

Minutes later, RealNetworks founder Rob Glaser kicked off session 3 "Media Biz" with the first public discussion of the results of his "progressive education branding project" undertaken with the Center for American Progress. The project created eight 30-second television spots and test marketed them. The spots include two that are take-offs of Apple Inc's PC/Mac advertisements.

"Aren't YOU a Progressive?", the ads ask in closing. Turns out, in at least one sample, progressive self-identification increases by 67% in these recent tests. The Youtube versions, linked above, were posted a few weeks ago.

No doubt the debate will continue in discussions outside the auditorium, as the contrast of the Progressive record of achievement along and the Libertarian critique make good fodder.

During Monday morning's "Media Biz" and "Nerd Alert" sessions, presenters frequently cited earlier presentations, as Jamy Ian Swiss had done Sunday evening.

Among the most oft-cited was Emily Levine, a perennial favorite "humorist philosopher" of RSW's TED conferences. Levine recounted how she had dealt with diagnosis of apoptosis of her prostate, and with a combination of gravity and humor led the audience through her evolution from comic writer to comic philosopher to "comic oracle", or "Emily 3.0". Apoptosis, it seems, leads to enlargement of the head and extremities. Levine concluded the entire country may be suffering from the malady - starting with the head of state.

Some other observations:

- "99% of medicine that we practice today was developed in my lifetime." - Keith Black, neurosurgeon who has conducted more than 5,000 brain surgeries over two decades.

- Working for the government I was reminded there was a situation the government could actually put me to death - treason, noted Keith Schwab, a Cornell physicist who expressed with a certain nervousness that his work was being supported by an employer who was "now threatening to kill me" if he were to misbehave...

- "There's only three things I've ever been afraid of - electricity, heights and women," - the words of a high wire power line repairman, in a video short interstitial.

- There are 10 times as many stars in the planetary system as there are grains of sand on Earth's beaches. - Paul Horowitz, Harvard professor of physics.

- "We live in a world governed by chance and probabilities," quantum physicist Brian Greene.

- "The web community is a big community. It's not the repository of all knowledge. It's the repository of discovery," Adam Savage, co-star of Mythbusters.

EG'07 feeling in your feet, building Cathedrals with 2 fingers

Michael Hawley has already delivered, as promised, a number of the "magical moments" connecting of synapses and themes between presenters long devised by Richard Saul Wurman as the genesis of the so-called "TED moment".

As Donald Jackson, HRH's Royal Calligrapher, lead 500+ attendees in the packed auditorium in scripting a stylized letter "A" with one hand in the air in front of us, he told us it was important to feel the motion in our feet.

A session later, magician Jamy Ian Swiss expressed appreciation for Jackson's remarks in telling the audience the trick to good magic could also include what happens in your feet. Swiss then proceeded to explain one of his card tricks - "I have a surprise for you," which he said takes most of his students six months or more to learn. He compared it with romantic comedy, and focused on the moment of 'Aristotelian catharsis' which he described as critical to the success of an entertaining trick.

In a different sort of catharsis... Hawley offered a screening of Michael Lawrence's elegant work in progress, the Bach Project. A collaboration among a number of terrific musical artists in homage to the great composer, the film includes music and interviews with some of the most successful contemporary artists, such as Bobby McFerrin. "Bach with two notes, one with the right hand, the other with the left, he can build a Cathedral, said Joáo Carlos Martins, the Brazilian pianist and conductor.

What more suitable metaphor for an event taking place within architect Richard Meier's $1.2 billion travertine-coated Getty Center stone edifice perched on a hilltop above Los Angeles.

Aspen IdeasFestival - Ups and Downs @ High Altitude

Charles Dickens might have been right at home at this year's Aspen IdeasFestival.

"It is the best of times, it is the worst of times," for contemplating the position of America in the world, might be how the scribe would have paraphrased his own Tale of Two Cities, after sampling the august presentations ranging from former president and perennial speaker Bill Clinton to Bush adviser Karl Rove.

In the days to come we will provide commentary on a number of themes that ran through the conference - not so much the 'official' tracks, but those of Climate Change and Development, Iraq and U.S. foreign policy, health care and promising new medical understandings, including the Brazilian physicist who demonstrated how monkeys have demonstrated the ability to control devices through brain signals, without any use of their limbs or muscles.

One overarching feeling shared by regular IdeasFestival attendees was this year's third annual event was somehow more subdued than its previous two iterations. High points, of course, included the greatest number of speakers (280) of whom roughly two-thirds were new this year, and the opening of the brand new, environmentally friendly and neatly designed Doerr-Hosier Center on the Aspen Meadows campus.

The conference, now in its third year, has been a sellout for months, with 600 attendees a day and a record 4,000 participants overall in two three day-plus sessions over the seven days plus several events in which tickets were made available to the general public. Wildly successful since its premier edition, Aspen IdeasFestival was named Conferenza's "Rookie of the Year" for the most outstanding new conference in 2005.

The consensus view, which mirrors what we observed, is the exalting experience of spending several days around the July 4th holiday contemplating Big Ideas in the stunning sunshine of the Rockies at midsummer is tempered a bit this year by the grim reality of America's current standing in the world. Issues which are clearly at the center of the dialogues sponsored by Aspen Institute over the decades now include many where America is playing catch-up - as in the case of Climate Change - or has alienated its allies, as in the case of Iraq. We observed a similar sobering impact that loomed over the usually upbeat Milken Global Conference in its 10th edition earlier this year. As one speaker noted, a silver lining in some respects is things can only improve.

No doubt, many of the participants will play a role in that process and, as is often the case, IdeasFestival will be a catalyst for building relationships among those wrestling with these issues.

Neither Clinton nor Rove broke new news.

As others have noted, and I'd agree, Clinton appeared for whatever reason very restrained if clear in his advocacy of his wife for president. Yet he was introduced lavishly as having become practically a "one man NGO" with his Clinton Global Initiative, and many accomplished attendees commented afterwards how he continually stuns them with his vast bredth of understanding of the context surround issues, domestic and foreign, personal and intergenerational.

Rove was introduced by industrialist and Institute Trustee Sydney Harmon as having "one of the brilliant minds and great charmers of this universe," which he said "would undoubtedly seduce you as he has seduced me", recalling last year's concluding session with Rove in which Harmon said many were taken in by the Bush adviser, only to decide later they didn't believe a word Rove had uttered. Rove impressed once again, describing in detail the planning around "the surge" in Iraq, the administration's stance on immigration, and other issues.

As with every Aspen IdeasFestival, the leadership of Aspen Institute (headed by former CNN CEO Walter Isaacson) and IdeasFestival director Kitty Boone has attracted myriad media and publishing luminaries, which in turn has engendered numerous commentaries listed on the Institute and Festival websites.

As noted earlier, this year the festival also stepped up its own web presence with a new site, offering highlight videos of major speeches and panels. One of the super conference benefits introduced by IdeasFestival is its support for ongoing discussions by posting transcripts, and often audioclips, of its sessions for use by attendees and the general public. The new site provides search access to transcripts from 2006, and pointers eventually to the 2007 transcripts.

Further coverage is available in The Aspen Times and Aspen Daily News. Blog postings by writers of The Atlantic cover everything from Clinton's ambiguities to unwanted predawn wakeup calls, from Lance Armstrong to a humorous writeup of how this author's iPhone brought the last bus to town to a standstill, while Aspen Public Radio station AJAX also has posted some interesting interview clips.

Aspen IdeasFestival: Valuing Ideas

The weeklong Aspen IdeasFestival straddles the Independence Day holiday and is noteworthy among conferences not only that it celebrates the world of ideas, but seeks to give its roughly 1,200 attendees and panelists an array of talks, interviews, panel discussions and socratic colloquia that offer many slants at the interrelationship and evolution of those ideas.

Elliot Gerson, Aspen Institute's executive in charge of seminars and programs, describes IdeasFestival as akin to the first week of classes at a university since attendees shop between a broad variety of subjects ranging from Shakespeare and leadership to the greening of corporations and from terrorism to the challenges of running a university, including Richard Brodhead, the president of scandal-encumbered Duke University and Lawrence Summers, who recently resigned as president of Harvard University.

IdeasFestival might be more aptly described as IdeasFeast. Participants are encouraged to gorge on topics both esoteric and popular and to seek out new, inspiring ideas from the veritable cornucopia of fora lead by intellectuals and practitioners from universities, politics, diplomacy, clerics and the business world.

In that context, the conference harkens back to the open exchange of ideas dating back to philosophers Socrate and Plato, of course, and also to America's Founding Fathers celebrated this week.

Such exchanges these days as throughout our history as a nation can often be noisy and chaotic - several panels were devoted to topics such as "Fake News, Spin and Inaccuracy in Media" and the bias of Left and Right in political discourse - as well as inspiring.

Organizers ensured the proceedings are all on the record, and there is generally ample time for questions and discussion.

Participants and presenters at this second annual event were no less invigorated by the wealth of simultaneous panels than a year ago, and many said it was a unique collection of leaders, creators and inventors.

The spirit reflects the writings of Thomas Jefferson, who wrote in a letter discussed during a Socrates Seminar at Aspen Institute prior to IdeasFestival, the open exchange of new ideas can proliferate among many to inspire a multitude of inventive efforts which can produce huge gains for human progress:

"That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density in any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation," Jefferson wrote.

David Bradley, chairman of The Atlantic Monthly, echoed Jefferson as he kicked off the conference by describing how ideas are a singular "great gift" with which humanity is endowed. "Our species is different from all others in the respect that it is capable of being seized by an idea," he said.

Readers of the posts to come from this excellent conference will recognize Conferenza's approach to IdeasFestival is to identify and track trends among several sessions in many cases, rather than individual efforts, and to reflect issues as they are addressed from multiple angles in successive sessions.

For those looking for further coverage: correspondents of The Atlantic, which is co-producing the conference with Aspen Institute, are keeping their own running blogs reflecting inspiring moments which strike their fancy.

TED 3 Themes - Doing Good and Doing Well to TED's Drumbeat!

Al Gore's coming back!

The man whose presentations served ostensibly as bookends for his first TED conference used the bully pulpit of the stage as TED2006's final speaker to announce he was coming back - no, not to politics, but to TED. Next year.

And that, coming from a man who likes to quip it's not been long since "I used to be the next President of the United States", says a lot about the transformation not only of the former vice president to the causes of averting global climate change and warning of media complacency, but also of TED.

TED2006 will likely go down as a remarkable year of consistent rhythm - a seamless alignment of the conference's original concentration on "Technology Entertainment Design" with TEDsteward Chris Anderson's vision of a world meeting social causes, often through inspired efforts of individuals commited to making a difference.

Not that Anderson will slow in his ambitious efforts to keep evolving the TEDconference and trying new ways to increase the velocity of productive communication between members of the TEDcommunity - whether through electronic introductions, the new TEDuniversity or various lunches, galas, beach parties and the two-years-running nighttime beachfront drumming session, this time sans Mickey Hart.

The three trends

0. Climate Change. Al Gore has been on a crusade for planetary preservation, warning influential audiences from Los Angeles to New York of the devastating potential impact of global warming. Allowed to break from TED's rigid 18-minute limit on talks, Gore was allocated a full one-hour Bonus Session on the opening day. With the disarming power of a sharp wit many had not expected and an up-to-date fact-filled slide show he made a compelling case global warming is fact, while doubt about is fiction. Afterwards, many who had doubted global warming were instead suggesting he needed a strong name for it - like global crisis or catastrophe. It's thus smart that Gore's releasing a film this spring, with "Pulp Fiction" producer Lawrence Bender who also attended TED, along with teams of surrogates to take the talk out to the country. Gore's was a sharp contrast to the presentation at TED2005 by Bjørn Lomborg, of skeptical environmentalist fame, which ranked climate degredation towards the bottom of priorites dubbed "bad projects" as decided by an assembly of experts.

0. Youth, Innovation and 'Upgrade Paradox". A variety of speakers addressed the issue of innovation, creativity, educating youth and our future. Sir Ken Robinson argued creativity is as important as literacy, and said we train it out of our youth. Zany astronomer Clifford Stoll suggested those who want to know the future 20 years out should ask kindergarten teachers, not technologists or futurists. Neil Gershenfeld of MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms described how his $20,000 mobile fab labs are used by young children, who are often bedazzled and spend hours learning to build complex technical systems. Finally, NYTimes tech columnist David Pogue described the "upgrade paradox" by which well-meaning, consenting (presumably) adults work to "improve" a piece of software so many times "you finally ruin it."

0. One Person Can. Over and over, speakers came to the stage demonstrating what a difference one person can make, whether it's the pioneering aviation of Burt Rutan, the video game worlds of David Perry, the natural animal-human interactions photographed by Gregory Colbert, or the aggregation of many individual testaments to violence of the Witness project as presented by musician Peter Gabriel.

The three themes - Ways to Get There

0. Doing Good and Doing Well. Green is the new... There was Al Gore, who professed that work to stem global overheating will create new jobs and businesses, and Bronx environmental activist Majora Carter, advocated ecological restoration projects, installing green roofs and improving traffic flows could create jobs ["Green is the new Black," is a phrase she uses to fight bad urban planning in predominantly African American neighborhoods]. Both argued economic incentives are crucial. Venture Capitalist Vinod Khosla cited similar success of economic incentives in Brazil, where adoption of "flex fuel" ethanol consuming cars has surged to 70% from 4%.

0. Ignore Assumptions. Live Forever (Nearly). Sprout New Limbs. In addition to the scorn of conventional education suppressing creativity, presenters argued we are often tied down by our own assumptions. Aubrey De Gray of Cambridge University suggests it is time to do away with ageing, which he says kills 90% of Americans and that extending lives of those destined to die of old age currently costs $200 billion in this country alone. It may seem unusual unless you, like De Gray, expect humans to naturally live to be 1,000. Similarly, regenerative medicine pioneer Dr. Alan Russell asked if a newt can regenerate a lost limb, why can't humans?

0. Look out for Patterns along the Way. Futurist Erik Peterson of the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Strategic and International Studies spoke of the challenge of population growth, governance, and information flows among the challenges we face over the next 20 years. Soon thereafter, Hans Rosling of Stockholm and Gapminder offers an engaging and graphic demonstration of the importance of drillng down into data and trends, and not overgeneralizing. Finally, Stanford biochemist Paul Berg, who shared the 1980 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, offered a fairly professorial walk through his recombinent DNA work. A couple of minutes from the end he launched into how identical twins' same genetic makeup can interact quite differently depending on the environment - worth a talk in its own right.

The three people

0. Larry Brilliant. Crowned as head of Google's foundation on the eve of TED, Brilliant energetically declared himself "the luckiest guy in the world" not for gaining that post, but for having seen the last case of smallpox in the world when he helped lead the eradication efforts. Furthermore, the maverick public health campaigner and former technology CEO aims to garner support with his $100,000 TEDprize to create a "Early Detect, Rapid Response" system that might stand a chance of halting avian flu before a pandemic spreads. He dubs this INSTEDD - International System for Total Early Disease Detection.

0. Cameron Sinclair & Jehane Noujaim. Yes, this will make it four people, yet Sinclair and Noujaim each deserve not only their individual $100,000 TEDprizes, but commendation for their efforts to raise the profile of innovative, humanitarian grassroots design and of independent, humanitarian films with their own famous TEDprize wishes.

0. Al Gore. Some Republican-leaning attendees spoke vehemently afterwards about how they felt two quips Gore made about the two presidents Bush, respectively, undermined his contention that Climate Change was an ethical, moral and spiritual issue, not a political one. Nonetheless, Gore won over many with a quick humor few saw in his public performances, his earnest climate campgain, and his frank assessment of his own political acumen. Asked by Anderson if he would run for president again, Gore noted that aside from election as vice president, he had run four times nationally and lost. To which one audience member blurted out "you won!" "Yeah, there is that," was Gore's reply.

The TED moment

TED has always been famous for its TED moments of amazing revelation.

This year, one such moment from off stage was recounted by Chris Herot, who found himself sitting on a bench in front of a tank of large fish during the TED gala evening at the Monterey Aquarium where he joined actress Meg Ryan and string theorist Brian Greene as they were deep in conversation around the origins of the universe and the concept of a larger purpose to existence. Also participating was Thomas Stat of the design consulting firm IDEO. "And in a moment that could only have occured at TED, not one but two people brought up what the Dalia Lama had told them about the topic in personal conversations they had had...," he reported.

The one complaint

TED2006 inserted itself smack in the middle of a broad trend of social entrepreneurship which has attracted innovators and philanthropists alike. Some long-time TEDsters still complain, as in recent years, there is 'less' of the T E and D in the TED experience, and that may very well be true.

Nonetheless, there was no lack of Technology at hand than engineer and pilot Burt Rutan or MIT D Lab head Amy Smith, or nor any shortage of intrinsic Entertainment and performance skill in Serena Huang, the 11-year-old violinist who also showed pluck at storytelling, saying she chose the instrument over the piano because with the violin she could hide it if she wanted to get out of practice, nor any shortage of Design sophistication with Joshua Prince-Ramus, architect of the Seattle Central Library.

Anderson's leadership is ambitious - he's announced a further TEDglobal conference in 2007 in Arusha, Tanzania, which some believe may require him to build a highway for participants to get there.

Yet, in a world of rapid change and literally dozens of fresh ideas for innovation and investment, an even greater challenge TED community faces is its impact outside the Monterey Conference Center and a four-day event. One can envision a far greater reach for TED, if it is able to preserve the intimacy of the event itself, while opening its flow of ideas more fully to the world. This could include greater public access outside even the amply-appointed simulcast room - which would also challenge the drumbeat of critics promoting open-source conferences.

Final thought

TED has resided for more than two decades among the pantheon on the top of the premier conferences, and deservedly so. Like any event or institution, conferences face a challenge of reinvention and remaining relevant. As Shel Israel noted in his interview with Tom Abate in last week's San Francisco Chronicle, TED's rhythm is beating to a younger and more hurried drumbeat than it had under design maestro Richard Saul Wurman, who founded and nurtured TED for years.

Under Wurman, TED was described by some early attendees as a form of "show and tell for adults" which involved into a "show and tell with geniuses for adults." Under Anderson, it is self consciously moving from the "Cirque du Soleil for the mind" he envisioned in acquiring TED to a "Cirque du Soleil for the mind, with humanitarian intent," much to the applause of an audience willing to plunk down $4,400 14 months in advance to ensure a spot in the conference's Main Hall.

TED is as strong as ever.

Finally, congratulations to 2005 TEDglobal (Oxford, UK) producer Bruno Giussani for his excellent liveblogging of all sessions, here, and ditto to the copious Ethan Zuckerman, who turned over his entire website to TED for four days of live blogging in which he estimates he wrote more than 19,000 words in 45 postings. Blogger Verite, indeed!

Up next for TED2007? "Icons. Geniuses. Mavericks." What more could you want?