Next Week, 500+ Geek Talks Around the World 60
Brady Forrest writes "Next week, from March 1-5 there will be ~65 Ignite events happening around the world. Ignite is an opportunity for geeks to share their passions and ideas with local peers. Each speaker gets 20 slides that each auto-advance after 15 seconds for a total of just 5 minutes. The result is bite-size chunks of information that inform the crowd on new topics. Most of the Ignites will be streamed on the new Ignite video site."
Around the world? (Score:1, Insightful)
There are events in the US, Australia and ... that's it. Sounds like the World Series.
Re:Pointless (Score:1, Insightful)
Seriously. How pointless. Ideas are cheap. Ideas are free. Ideas are a dime a dozen. Ideas are [insert cliched metaphor about overwhelming abundance here]. What a waste of time. We have the Internet. We have freakin' Slashdot. Ignite is not only redundant, it's likely to be a freak show. Full of otaku and Timecube types.
Ideas are worthless without execution, and execution doesn't happen without money (with the sole exception of open source software). I could give a 20 slide 5 minute presentation about 40 different tech-related things but I'm not even going to bother to watch the online video of that event because I've heard it all before, just like all of you have, and I'm getting heartily tired of having my face pressed up against the glass of the candy store wishing I had a nickel in my grubby little hand.
I'll keep reading Slashdot, keep wading through all the stories about the advancing copyright police state to find the few interesting stories about hardware being built by people who do have a few nickels. But I won't listen to a bunch of losers just like me, full of ideas and enough technical know-how to be dangerous, but going nowhere fast.
1. Networking: find people who are interested into tech and want to HIRE!
2. Geek Gals: find a lovely maiden who will not resist intellectual talk.
3. Something to do: fighting boredom.
Re:Well, TED did jump the shark this year (Score:4, Insightful)
I wouldn't pay fifty cents to see another TED video. They're all the same. Someone who is famous for something stands in front of a pretty slideshow and states 3-4 little-known facts that are interesting and draws obvious inferences from them. He then says thanks and that's it. Heck, I could read the backs of Trivial Pursuit cards and get the same thing. I have yet to see a TED video where the presenter ties all of his ramblings together into a prediction, or a new synthesis. They are all just regurgitated fact-sharing.
It would be all-right if the fact-sharing was educational or comprehensive. "I'm going to explain the housing bust to you" or "let me explain how X works". Great. But TED is neither comprehensive nor educational. It's just random observations, hypothesis, exposition, and "let me tell you a story" stuff.
I watched one by Misha Glenny not long ago. I've read and enjoyed his books, but the TED video was like sitting with him after he's had a few beers and listen to him talk stream-of-consciousness. Kinda interesting but after a few minutes you start to think "where is all this going?" and it turns out it's going nowhere. His books told the story of post-war Eastern Europe and had a definite goal. The TED video felt like "they paid me to stand up here and entertain you for 10 minutes".
Every single video is like that! TED is waste of time.