My Friend TED

Ever heard of TED talks? Well, you have now, which means you no longer have an excuse for ignoring one of the coolest sites on the web.

Side note: TED somehow managed to get its hands on the wonderfully simple domain name www.ted.com. Somewhere, Ted Danson and Ted Nugent must be fuming.

Anyway, TED is an organization for science/technology types, the kind of people who eagerly await the day when they can legally marry their Blackberry. TED conferences usually feature a series of speakers from the realms of--as the acronym TED implies--"technology, entertainment, and design." The talks are recorded and posted free to the world on TED.com.

We are talking very cool stuff. Why, just today I listened to talks about suspended animation, the relationship between music and architecture, and the irrationality of human decision-making. Many thanks go to my friend Ben for turning me on to TED.

If you're looking for somewhere to start in TED's vast video library, I highly recommend these two talks from science-y arts-y guy Ken Robinson.

Side note: in the first speech, he is billed as "Ken Robinson." In the second one, he has become "Sir Ken Robinson." Obviously, that first speech went over particularly well in some quarters.