Somethink completely different – TEDx Rotterdam

by | Jun 11, 2010 | FINDS & INSPIRATION, GLIMPSES OF MY LIFE | 1 comment

Do you know TED? I think TED is just great. It stands for Technology, Entertainment and Design and is all about IDEAS WORTH SPREADING. When it says TEDx it’s an independently organised TED event.

The events are free, which is amazing, but also the strength of TED. It is not unusual for an event like this to cost 1500 euro to attend and so limiting the (type of) people you reach. TED wants to spread ideas to everyone :-) So I felt lucky to get one of the 800 tickets for last weeks event in Rotterdam.

It took place in the new Luxor theatre in the heart of Rotterdam near the water and the famous ‘swan’ bridge. I was a bit early, so found my self a place in the sun and enjoyed seeing so many others arrive by bike.  Once inside we were welcomed by live music, coffee and croissants. I must say the catering was wonderful all day, nothing short. And as my dad says, “if you got a meal you got a lot”. And here it came with lots of great ideas besides :-)

There where in total about 30 speakers and performers, divided over 4 themes: our world, how we see the world, how we experience the world and how we explore the world.  I will not go into details about each talk, I welcome you to have a look at the site of TEDx Rotterdam where a video’s will be posted of each talk.

The ideas that stuck we me is the about decentralizing, globalization and simplifying, these reoccurred in the talks of several speakers (igor nikolic, jan bor, richard straver). Also several talks on energy makes one hopeful that a future after oil is possible, if we just cooperate (reinier de graaf).  Generate local the best energy, here on the coast wind energy, down in the south of Europe solar energy. So local (decentralized), but set in a global bigger scheme. It was nice to hear that green houses (meiny prins) now generate more energy than they use and so can provide several hundreds of houses with energy, so move a greenhouse to each community so they can have their own energy source. Brings food closer to the consumer too, so there energy is won too.

Thanks to the global www I’m selling my ceramics and jewellry, and might not even have considered it without a global platform such as Etsy. At the same time Etsy can’t exist without all those local crafters somewhere on this planet. So this globalization is good and brings us closer. The more we listen to social media (arjen el fassed) the better we get to know each other and will know first hand was is going on in the world. On the other hand is it important that we retreat to ‘an island’ once in a while to give our own ideas and a chance and not be influenced by all our connections; islands create diversity (bas haring).
It was a great day and I met several lovely people (even me who’s not great at meeting new people and making new connections). What I liked most was the positive buzz and interest, the atmosphere of being connected and it’s all going to be alright. There were many other speakers which I cannot mention all, but were equally or even more interesting. And from all the performers I’d like to include a glimpse of Ntjam Rosie:

For more info and video’s of talks go to TED or TEDx Rotterdam.

1 Comment

  1. pinipiru
    pinipiru on 12 June 2010 at 09:35

    TED is realy realy great!
    It sounds a bit freaky, but it gives hope if you hear all these people talk:)
    And that’s it isn’t it, working together!
    And everybody is capable of making a change:)
    TED rules!!

    Like you blog by the way:)

    Reply

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