Monday, July 8, 2019

Ted.. you've hit bottom!


 Like many people, I enjoy the TED talks, one of the radio stations I listen to plays them on Sunday. Sometimes I watch video clips on YouTube. They have great speakers and a wide range of topics presented by experts in their field... or at least they used to.

 I often sat spellbound by presentations on space, time, evolution, human evolution, dark matter etc, etc. Some people are so brilliant and often there is mind blowing research going on that the average person has no idea about, the TED talks were bringing those fantastic ideas to the public... until now. Lately I have become disappointed by the TED talks, I think TED has either run out of good guests... or it's become a good product to sell on the radio market and he is just looking for content.

 The once expert speakers has become just some journalists that is researching a story or a person thinking about writing a book on a topic. An example is, a local radio host was on one week as a guest talking about racism. Now don't get me wrong, I actually like and respect this gentleman but who is he to speak on this subject. A white man raised in Ottawa Canada and I have never heard of him working on anything before regarding race relations, he's just good at speaking. Last week was a woman talking about losing a loved one, she wasn't a psychologist or psychiatrist, just someone who lost a family member. She was going on about making people use the words she wants to hear like "moving forward" and how you have to mentally take the dead person with you in life, blah blah blah and I suddenly felt like I have heard all that garbage before, that's the same mush we used to hear on the Oprah Winfrey show... ugh!

  This week it was about things like greed and being envious, leading I guess to how we can be better people, maybe hold hands and sing together while the host suddenly started shouting, "you get a car and you get a car and you get a car"! Awful, bring back the scientists, the geneticists, the physicists and all the other "trained" icists that you used to have before because right now I feel that I could do a Ted talk on what ever is popular and I shouldn't feel that way. Sorry TED but lately I think you're scraping the bottom of the barrel.

16 comments:

Deedles said...

I have no idea what TED is, aside from my stuffed bear collection. Looks like I haven't missed much. I stopped paying attention to Oprah once she became Jesus. I can't deal with ersatz messiah figures.

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Deedles, no she became the great and all powerful "O" bask in her glow of wisdom.
TED talks were/are lectures usually regarding something along the lines of science discoveries etc, so yes you did miss out if you like to get your geek on! My problem is it feels like someone switched my National Geographic with Celebrity Gossip! :p

Old Lurker said...

I grew tired of the TED talk tone some time ago. They have always been disappointing, in the sense that they would often highlight amazing new discoveries (modular housing for the poor! solar generation for everyone!) that were actually half-baked prototypes. When you looked into what happened to those ideas a few years later you would see that almost all of them came to nothing.

Having said that I really ought to start listening to TED talks again, I guess. Have you listened to the Eve Ensler ones? I found them particularly refreshing.

I hope you are not on the Internet all day again today? Isn't today a work day for you?

Leanna said...

I love TED talks. I love perusing the site to look for the scientific and sometimes funny talks. There are a lot of interesting things to hear on this site.
https://www.ted.com/talks

Deedles said...

Steven, dear heart, I don't have a science geek in me and my great and powerful "O" is something else entirely different from Oprah! We won't go into that here because I am trying to filter my TMIs.

Old Lurker said...

It is much better to have great and powerful "O"s than to lie back and think of England.

Okay, okay. I'm going outside now. Gee whiz.

Richard said...

I stopped listening to TED talks a while ago. I think they have strayed from their original mission.

Bob said...

I've never seen a TED talk, though I'm sure some of my ramblings might qualify as one.

And dOn't get me started On Oprah. I lOathe her. O hOw I lOathe her.

Sixpence Notthewiser said...

TED talks can be really good.
There are several kinds of styles: biographies, discoveries, etc, maybe the first type you’ve listened to. . There’s also TEDx talks, that may be the ones you’ve listened to lately on YouTube , they’re more e lactic and can be a little esoteric sometimes.
XoXo

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Old Lurky poo, I will check Eve out, maybe I already listened to her. Pie in the sky is not my thing either.
Yes I was playing on the internet until you chased me off, (thanks for that) but I didn't have to go to work today because it's national maple syrup day and we pour maple syrup on ourselves and try to get people to lick it off. This year I went nude!

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Leanna, maybe I will only start to listen on line. The radio show has really been lacking quality lately.

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Deedles, and we thank you for not making us squirm because of TMI.

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Lurker, so I started a catch phrase?

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Richard, it's like TED talks are the in thing and now everybody wants in on the action.

Sooo-this-is-me said...

bOb, "you get annoyed and you get annoyed and you get annoyed"! TED talks used to be really good, I can't guarantee that now if you happen to hear one.

Sooo-this-is-me said...

Sixpence, you may be right, I wasn't aware there were two different groups. I was thinking that maybe the usual people who make a living by public speaking were trying to get in on the action.