TEDxSydney 2010 happened at CarriageWorks on Saturday 22 May and featured a selection of Australia's leading visionaries and storytellers showcasing their Ideas Worth Spreading LIVE to a group of thinkers ... as well as ONLINE to the world at large. Here are some of the videos. We are uploading more talks as they become ready. Please keep checking back for more!
Sometimes magic happens … as it did at TEDxSydney on Saturday 22 May at CarriageWorks.
Almost 30 live speakers and performers presented on the main stage with the Bay 17 theatre before a selected audience of 700 … many of whom had flown in for the event from other parts of Australia. All of the speaker and performer videos have been uploaded to the TEDxTalks channel on YouTube and can be viewed HERE.
Some highlights:
+ Jon Jureidini’s thought provoking talk on the danger of compromise and the fallacy of the middle ground
+ Nigel Marsh’s humorous observations about work life balance
+ Rachel Botsman’s compelling presentation on global trends in collaborative consumption
+ Brett Solomon’s talk on citizen journalism and the democratisation of news coverage
+ An earthy Missy Higgins performance that included two new songs never before recorded
+ Andrew Kuper’s presentation on microinsurance and its burgeoning role as “The Insurer to the Poor”
+ A presentation from Rob Adams, the chief city planner from Melbourne on why denser cities are better cities
In parallel to the live event within the theatre, there was a live community event called The Forum in the CarriageWorks foyer where a further 1,000 or so people watched a simulcast on a jumbo LED screen provided by one of the many TEDxSydney in-kind sponsors. The Forum was open to everyone and free. During the session breaks, the second stage in The Forum was used to interview the TEDxSydney speakers … enabling the audience to interact with and question the speakers. The unique content developed especially for The Forum included poetry readings, pre-recorded videos and rapidly edited audience grabs from the day. Some even rated it as a superior experience to the theatre event.
The full schedule was filmed by Major Media Partner the ABC (Australia’s public broadcaster) and streamed live to individuals and viewing groups located throughout Australia and the rest of the world. Demand for the stream was higher than anticipated, and this resulted in some server issues. Lessons were learned for next year. Even so, thousands were able to watch the livestream from home.
Local feedback was very positive, and the organisers received dozens of emails from grateful attendees e.g. this from the owner of an influential marketing blog: “Just a note to say I’ve been in Australia for about four years now, and TEDxSydney was the best event I’ve attended in that time. Everything about it was brilliant.” The archival twitstream tells a similar story HERE. Finally, check out these blogged summaries by:
+ Business21C < an excellent summary of the day
+ Pia Waugh < the most retweeted blog posting so far
+ Patty Huntington < includes good documentation of the UTS Zone cubes
+ Josh Capelin < 3 memorable points
+ Daniel Boud < lots of great photos here
+ _technoist_ < this blogger was early out of the gate
+ iThink.com < he really loved Nigel Marsh’s talk
Finally, we were also happy that Lara Stein was able to make it to TEDxSydney … on the tail end of a trip that took in TEDxTokyo and TEDxGreatWall. Lara and Remo have known each other for over 20 years, and this was a great way for them to reconnect. Lara promises to stay for longer than 24 hours next year!
