Where good ideas come from | Steven Johnson: Video on TED.com

A dynamic writer and speaker, Steven Johnson crafts captivating theories that draw on a dizzying array of disciplines, without ever leaving his audience behind. Author Kurt Anderson described Johnson's book Emergence as "thoughtful and lucid and charming and staggeringly smart." The same could be said for Johnson himself. His big-brained, multi-disciplinary theories make him one of his generation's more intriguing thinkers. His books take the reader on a journey -- following the twists and turns his own mind makes as he connects seemingly disparate ideas: ants and cities, interface design and Victorian novels.

Johnson's breakout 2005 title, Everything Bad Is Good for You , took the provocative stance that our fear and loathing of popular culture is misplaced; video games and TV shows, he argues, are actually making us smarter. His appearances on The Daily Show and Charlie Rose cemented his reputation as a cogent thinker who could also pull more than his share of laughs. His most recent work, The Ghost Map, goes in another direction entirely: It tells the story of a cholera outbreak in 1854 London, from the perspective of the city residents, the doctors chasing the disease, and the pathogen itself. The book shows how the epidemic brought about profound changes in science, cities and modern society. His upcoming work, Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation, tells the fascinating stories of great ideas and great thinkers across disciplines.

No mere chronicler of technology, Johnson is himself a longtime innovator in the web world: He was founder and Editor in Chief of FEED, one of the earliest and most interesting online magazines. He cofounded outside.in, an intriguing website that maps online conversations to real-world neighborhoods.

The Video of the Month Sept 2010 - Chris Anderson

The Video of the The Month
September 2010
How Web Video Powers Global Innovation
with
Chris Anderson, Curator and Producer TED
TED's Chris Anderson says the rise of web video is driving a worldwide phenomenon he calls Crowd Accelerated Innovation -- a self-fueling cycle of learning that could be as significant as the invention of print. But to tap into its power, organizations will need to embrace radical openness. And for TED, it means the dawn of a whole new chapter..

Video of the Month August 2010 - Clay Shirky, The Concept of Cognitive Surplus

The Video of the Month
August 2010
The Concept of Cognitve Surplus, What It Is and Why It Will Change The World
Clay Shirky

The Video of the Month July 2010 - Tan Le and the Digital Control Device

The Video of the Month July 2010
Tan Le and The Digital Control Device


Tan Le is the co-founder and president of Emotiv Systems, a firm that's working on a new form of remote control that uses brainwaves to control digital devices and digital media. It's long been a dream to bypass the mechanical (mouse, keyboard, clicker) and have our digital devices respond directly to what we think. Emotiv's recently released EPOC headset uses 16 sensors to listen to activity across the entire brain. Software "learns" what each user's brain activity looks like when one, for instance, imagines a left turn or a jump.

Watch this and be amazed!!

21st Century Fluency Group Project

This neat video presentation entitled "Infowhelm and Information Fluency" from the 21st Century Fluency Project, created by InfoSavvy Group, Vancouver, Canada asks the simple yet complex question with the tsunami of digital information being created daily, do we need to learn differently?