To Be Titled

Striving to be a good dad, a good husband, a good son/brother, a good political scientist, a good photographer, a good cook and a good homo universalis.

Posts tagged TED

“Life Lessons from Big Cats” — by Beverly & Dereck Joubert. The photos, videos and stories are amazing.

I don’t consider myself to live in a “man box,” but this talk by Tony Porter at TEDWomen gave me some things to think about.

This is Duncan Davidson of—among many other things—TED and O’Reilly conferences photography, Luma Loop and Daily Shoot fame. He was part of TEDx Oil Spill that took place in Washington, D.C. on Monday, in particular the expedition team of photographers who went down to the Gulf region to interview people, capture and document the effects of the oil spill. The photos are here—Pinar’s, Kris’s and Duncan’s—and the recording of Duncan’s presentation and all the other presentations at TEDx is here. The team is still looking to recoup the costs they incurred for the expedition through donations. He probably doesn’t want to be personally featured in the manner I’m presenting him (he subconsciously stepped out of the limelight during his presentation), but this photo so precisely captures what he has done and continues to do for the oil spill. I deeply respect him for putting his professional skills to a cause he believes in.

This is Duncan Davidson of—among many other things—TED and O’Reilly conferences photography, Luma Loop and Daily Shoot fame. He was part of TEDx Oil Spill that took place in Washington, D.C. on Monday, in particular the expedition team of photographers who went down to the Gulf region to interview people, capture and document the effects of the oil spill. The photos are here—Pinar’s, Kris’s and Duncan’s—and the recording of Duncan’s presentation and all the other presentations at TEDx is here. The team is still looking to recoup the costs they incurred for the expedition through donations.

He probably doesn’t want to be personally featured in the manner I’m presenting him (he subconsciously stepped out of the limelight during his presentation), but this photo so precisely captures what he has done and continues to do for the oil spill. I deeply respect him for putting his professional skills to a cause he believes in.

I walked/bussed to work this morning and had a chance to watch another TED talk. This is an absolutely amazing story of a little girl getting adopted from Korea. The photographer who facilitated the process in the late 1970s—Rick Smolan—is a great storyteller. Watch this instead of a sitcom episode.

Clay Shirky on collaborative arrangements replacing traditional institutions—e.g. firms, journalists, etc.—given the right information infrastructure. What he argues is happening at the domestic level seems to be how international institutions (e.g. the GATT/WTO) have long functioned—by decentralizing implementation and enforcement. In that sense, international institutions have always been closer to collaborative arrangements than traditional institutions at the domestic level. This is especially true since whatever collective outcomes that international institutions seek to generate, the state-level behaviors have to be self-enforcing like Flickr users voluntarily choosing to tag their photos with certain keywords in Shirky’s example.

An interesting question is whether international institutions will better utilize the information technology infrastructure that has emerged and is evolving. The best example so far of such an attempt seems to be http://www.globaltradealert.org/

Making the Clackity Noise

Okay, so, that’s what was in my keyboard just now. I didn’t know it was in there when I sat down to compliment Buffering on his 105 words that made me think about how I love little stories. This is why writing is fucked up and awesome and makes a 42-year-old man cry about cigarettes and Pete Rose and an ugly green car on a perfectly temperate Sunday afternoon.

Your keyboard will have different things in it than mine does, of course. But, it’s impossible to know what’s in there until you’ve made the clackity noise for a few minutes. You think you know what’s in there. But you don’t. It’s not your brain that makes the clackity noise, it’s your fingers.

This is a take by Merlin Mann that pulls together 1) the importance of collecting stories (by Jonathan Harris) and 2) the fleeting/uncertain nature of creative writing (by Elizabeth Gilbert). I agree with his call for changing the culture of banality online. [Via Kung Fu Grippe; HT marco]

I almost decided to skip this talk during the first couple of minutes. The stories and photographs Harris brings back from around the world—especially from Bhutan—are amazing, as are his means of presenting them.

Elizabeth Gilbert, the author of Eat, Pray, Love, on the capricious nature of creativity [via TED.com]