The 3L Mantra to live by!

Sarah Darwin talks about Darwin's journey replayed today Like the usual family pressure is not enough, having Charles Darwin as your great great grandfather must hardly be an easy feat. That said, rather than hide from it, Sarah Darwin embraces it openly and audaciously retraces the “emotional” journe, as she calls it, of the HMS Beagle. A biologist herself, Sarah describes how she and her family set sail round the world on the Dutch clipper Stad-Amsterdam, starting at the same port where Charles Darwin embarked around 178 years ago... Check out the TEDx website for more: Sarah Darwin: Following in your footsteps great great granddaddy! AND Peter van Lindonk's talk on demanding creativity as ground for unity for stimulating ideas It’s about time someone added chutzpah into conferences! Aren’t most conferences about remembering the lines but forgetting the theatre of it all? Peter van Lindonk, the co-founder of the annual PINC-Conference, knows this better than most people as he...

Green bordered Press Passes and RESERVED written on red velvet seats...its nice being the Press! Cookies and koffie; polaroids being taken to give some kind of instant energy feeling; long-bearded men, probably all eco-warriors or physicists... spotted! Admittedly, as we blog away with our Apple computers in a row (with every other minute checking Facebook), we're deeply concerned about more pressing issues such as what we should do with our goodie bags post conference when we go for the after-party to Chicago Boom! Such are the troubling times we live in. Other issues do seep in such as what can we say about someone whose claim to fame is that she is the great great granddaughter of Charles Darwin...ok, but what about it? And of aliens on stage...er? and fake snow falling on a man who has come from Africa in his native costume, saying that this is the first time he has left his hometown and he receives unanimous applaud...because??? One is tempted to see this as condescending, an...

So, fanatic that I am for TED conferences ...well, actually, calling this a conference is akin to calling caviar food or the ipad a computer. The cult of TED is more like it, from Ideas Worth Spreading to Fanaticism Worth Holding onto! It all started in the oh so cliche California where people came together to give "the talk of their lives " er...in 18 minutes. (Andy Warhol promised a 5 minute fame so lets just say inflation just kicked in). It started by pontificating about Technology, Entertainment and Design and now has spread to any topic that can be delivered in a way that will make an audience feel cool n cutting edge, and if you can squeeze in a tear or two from them, more the power to you! Ah and did I mention this is an invite only event, nurturing the VIP instinct amongst an eclectic group of people who need reassurances of their role in life like myself? There is nothing like a good dose of intellectual elitism to get people's attention...simple supply and de...