The integrity died in the name of views, I think. I don't miss TED.
>> TED of course can’t be held solely responsible for the increasingly eschatological pronouncements of this cohort [the tech elite]. That would be, in a way, to buy into its hype too much. But as the most visible and influential public speaking platform of the first two decades of the twenty-first century, it has been deeply implicated in broadcasting and championing the Silicon Valley version of the future. TED is probably best understood as the propaganda arm of an ascendant technocracy. It helped refine prediction into a rhetorical art well-suited to these aspiring world conquerors — even the ones who fail.
For a while it was cool for people to do such talks, the problem is that those people don't have unlimited things to say, so naturally when all important stuff is said and done, only lower quality content is left, with the expected spiral to the bottom until it doesn't matter any longer and is time to move on.
TED talks tend to have a certain style and pattern. And, like a given TV show, there comes a point when the particular style and pattern starts to get repetitive and tiresome. Once you've seen 50 TED talks, even if the 51st would be fairly compelling in isolation, it maybe feels like more of the same in context.
The fashion has mostly moved to other things.
He couldn't write a 3 line Python program or solve a high school trigonometry problem or answer a basic history question.
At a TEDx I attended, wind powered beach robots dazzled, a consultant gave a powerful spoken-word poem suggesting that consultants’ reports should be written as poetry to actually drive real change... [I actually have done bug reports as poems, which was great.] Both truly wonderful and stuck in my memory.
But another sticks in my head for just being a weird thing in that forum: a woman upset after her uterus crapped out after three kids, when she wanted like 6+... Normally such a talk would be about dealing with grief around broken dreams and moving on with life, or about her adventures with adoption... but rather this was how she stuck with those dreams for a biological child even though hospitals were like “you have three healthy kids why are you trying to do IVF with a surrogate?” and eventually they got the IVF done abroad but it didn't implant but they have new schemes and plans. I'm not even opposed to her goal, just it didn't seem very TED-y.
Couldn't watch it beyond 5 minutes. But comments there was fun to read.
IIRC Holmes appeared on TED, not TEDx. There's been plenty of hucksterism associated with the main TED. The concept itself is a bit grifty. It's sugar coated glittering generalities and idea peddling (what if xyz were true?)
If it's truly for entertainment value, there's nothing wrong with TED, but it pretends to be something else. It pretends to be a beacon in society; a marketplace for the hottest new ideas.
When you listen to speakers like Gladwell (who I've heard accurately described as the walking embodiment of a TED talk) they are very convincing with whatever idea they're selling. After you peel beneth the surface you find the evidence is really shaky for what he claims, but he makes it seem like such a sure thing; settled science. In some ways I think he acts as an information distortion/amplification device. He makes claims with certainty no self-respecting scientists would make.
Also, this isn't talked about much, but TED has always been a gathering of the elites. You're literally not invited. I'm somewhat surprised it hasn't showed up in more conspiracies. They've been running these shows in a cult like atmosphere, too. This has never been an accessible program. It's where billionaires go to smooze and decide how to spend their money. You might as well be watching a Goldman Sac's retreat (but this is silicon valley, so it's supposed to be different for some reason)
It's much harder to bullshit your way through a 1-2 hour long podcast conducted by a knowledgeable host.
A great take, in one line... ;)
Probably not. You would be reasonable for avoiding the bags touching that one, just to avoid the rot. The reason "on bad apple spoils the bushel" exists is because obvious rot generally means there is other rot you cannot see without further inquiry - and that those without rot will probably be tainted soon.
And that's the problem: Once you find one bad speaker, you have to be suspicious of so many more. It is probably better to move onto something more trustworthy because watching nonsense means you've increased your chances of remembering and repeating nonsense later.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8znQZ1RUckg
He gave that talk during 2015, the same year that Bill Gates gave the talk about the possibility of a global pandemic. As the article above suggests, Ted Talks were at their peak in 2015, but also TEDx was ruining the brand.
If anyone is curious about my ex-business partner, I talk about him, and my time working with him, in the introduction of How To Destroy A Tech Startup In Three Easy Steps:
https://www.amazon.com/Destroy-Tech-Startup-Easy-Steps/dp/09...
So, this is a great example of the ideas discussed in the article. Entertaining, a little woo-woo, preying on optimism, and ultimately, probably entirely inconsequential.
Your book looks interesting, too. I’ll check it out.
Don't be too salty, the idea was shitty from the beginning :-)
I wonder how your ex-partner feels about the fact that this book exists documenting his missteps and misfortunes. Ironically, with your book, you have created a durable artifact of the type that he described in his talk, giving people a chance to replay a portion of his lived experience.
As I said elsewhere in the thread, I worked with him for 6 years. I wouldn't have stayed that long if he lacked all merit. He has an obvious natural intelligence, and some creative ideas. Especially in the early days, he had a charisma that allowed us to raise more money. We did some really interesting work.
If not it is a fairly surefire recipe for disaster, there are some exceptions but the majority of the cases that I am familiar with the party with the money ended up either taking advantage of the other(s), ended up with a disproportionate share of the loot or was able to take more risk. This skews the outcome in their favor more often than not.
It is a pocket edition of why when you're born wealthy you are likely to end up even more wealthy.