TED Conference : opening night party is already overwhelming
2009-02-04
Opening-night welcome party at the TED Conference. Socially overwhelming. The density of great conversation is overwhelming! Like the most perfect party I can imagine, but so much more than I imagined that I'm not sure if I can handle it.
I turn to anyone next to me and say hello, and find out they invented Virtual Reality, or the synthesizer, or launched iGoogle, or wrote one of my favorite books, or are just really absolutely brilliant and interesting even if not famous. Lots of entrepreneurs.
In my first two hours I had good conversations with:
...and bumped into:
Funny to note that at a place like this, Kevin Rose was more popular than the movie stars, who were surprisingly unhounded.
Because this blog is public I should just clarify that I'm not namedropping to impress, but just to accurately describe the scene here. It's almost too many of my heroes in one place. Strange feeling.
Anyway, it's just 1am as I got back from this opening party. Four more days of this to go!
That's krazy kool as Paula Abdul would say!
I still wanna know what Meg Ryan and Glenn Close were doing there.
Are they closet nerds? ;)
...it's where YOU belong Derek! Welcome!
Is there some kind of code of secrecy? Why no explanation on their site of the acronym TED? I guess it's a tech think tank kind of thing. I hope you write up some kind of a digest for mortals to read. Their website is cool but annoying.
Alexa, TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design - but it has evolved into far more than that. A diverse group of people looking to make the world a better place, and together trying to figure out what that means.
Derek, it's gets even better. Savor these days. Hey, let's meet up in the Telepresence room around 1PM today, b4 lunch.
Wow! Can't wait for the nuggets from afar.
Derek, I can't help but laugh.
Just think of how those heroes you mention feel about meeting YOU. You're the guy who gave independent music a future-changing rocket boost by founding CDBaby.
Without that, I'd still be thinking 'getting signed' was the way forward.
When people ask who I am & what I do, I say, "Eh. Nothing. I'm just a guy. How about you?"
It's wonderful to just be all ears. Everyone's smart. Most are interesting.
Yeah Derek!
Such a gass to follow you--the learning curve is expanential!
Hey thanks for your mini-report, Derek. There is a video podcast with the latest speeches up there. It's so fascinating!
Hey Derek,
I saw a snippet of Tony Robbins speak at the TED conference. One word. UNBELIEVABLE!
Please share.
Jared
Ha ha ha, Not name dropping to impress. Aye right Dezza, pull the other one.
Gordon
.unimpressed.
This was good information to read. Thank you for sharing it with me.
Sincerely Thanks
Bertha Payne, Blues Artist
And there were probably a bunch of people who saw you at TED and thought to themselves, wow, I love his blog and now I'm sitting next to Derek Sivers. Because here, as well, 'the opposite is true'.