ClydeR
05-19-2012, 11:06 AM
This past March, millionaire tech investor and entrepreneur Nick Hanauer – one of the early backers of Amazon.com – gave a talk at a TED conference in which, among other things, suggested that middle-class consumers, not rich people, are the real job creators – and that because of this rich people should be paying more in taxes. Though the talk drew applause from conference attendees at the time, TED Talk curator Chris Anderson decided it wasn’t worth sharing with the wider world, and refused to post it on TED’s website.
His explanation? The talk was “too political” to be posted during an election year, and that “a lot of business managers and entrepreneurs would feel insulted” by some of Hanauer’s arguments. This seems more than a tad disingenuous, since TED generally doesn’t shy away from controversial ideas, and is sometimes so “political” that it invites actual politicians to talk at its conferences.
Naturally, the news that TED wouldn’t be posting this talk — and why — ignited a bit of a firestorm on the web after the National Journal reported it on Wednesday, inspiring posts on sites ranging from Geekwire to the International Business Times to the Daily Kos. Someone even set up a petition on Change.org to demand that TED post the talk.
But there was really no need for any petition. This being the age of the Internet, Hanauer’s “banned” talk didn’t remain banned for long. The Atlantic published the entire text of the short talk, complete with slides, on its website, and Anderson himself relented, sort of, and posted the video of the talk — though on YouTube, not on the TED site, where it will no doubt get many times the numbers of views that it would have if it had simply been posted on the TED site in the first place, as Anderson himself acknowledges in a blog post explaining his side of the controversy.
More... (http://business.time.com/2012/05/18/was-nick-hanauers-ted-talk-on-income-inequality-too-rich-for-rich-people/)
This has been all over the internet. I watched the video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBx2Y5HhplI). There's good reason why the TED people declined to post it -- because it's the wrong opinion. The video isn't that good, and the TED people believe you shouldn't be exposed to it. I recommend that you don't watch it.
His explanation? The talk was “too political” to be posted during an election year, and that “a lot of business managers and entrepreneurs would feel insulted” by some of Hanauer’s arguments. This seems more than a tad disingenuous, since TED generally doesn’t shy away from controversial ideas, and is sometimes so “political” that it invites actual politicians to talk at its conferences.
Naturally, the news that TED wouldn’t be posting this talk — and why — ignited a bit of a firestorm on the web after the National Journal reported it on Wednesday, inspiring posts on sites ranging from Geekwire to the International Business Times to the Daily Kos. Someone even set up a petition on Change.org to demand that TED post the talk.
But there was really no need for any petition. This being the age of the Internet, Hanauer’s “banned” talk didn’t remain banned for long. The Atlantic published the entire text of the short talk, complete with slides, on its website, and Anderson himself relented, sort of, and posted the video of the talk — though on YouTube, not on the TED site, where it will no doubt get many times the numbers of views that it would have if it had simply been posted on the TED site in the first place, as Anderson himself acknowledges in a blog post explaining his side of the controversy.
More... (http://business.time.com/2012/05/18/was-nick-hanauers-ted-talk-on-income-inequality-too-rich-for-rich-people/)
This has been all over the internet. I watched the video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBx2Y5HhplI). There's good reason why the TED people declined to post it -- because it's the wrong opinion. The video isn't that good, and the TED people believe you shouldn't be exposed to it. I recommend that you don't watch it.