History of TED Conferences

The TED conferences have been growing in popularity in the past years, culminating in exciting and inspiring presentations, such as those presented in New Jersey at the TEDx Libraries event. However, few people, including the presenters, know the full story of how the TED program emerged as one of the most important think tank conferences in the world. The TED company was founded in 1984 by Harry Marks and Richard Saul Wurman with the idea of using ideas to bring real change to the world landscape. The event changed ownership hands in 2002, with Chris Anderson taking the reigns under the guidance of The Sapling Foundation, his nonprofit organization.

This shift in ownership changed the format of the conferences, but the general concept behind the conferences remains the same. Currently, a person must pay $6.000 per year to be a member of the TED conferences, but this price includes invitations to the conferences and TEDTalks as well as many other important resources, such as DVDs of the TEDTalks, valuable networking tools, and mailings that announce all upcoming TED events.

To reduce the exclusivity of the TED conferences, the organizers started posting videos of the TEDTalks online so that anyone would be able to view them. With this online access, TED has seen huge jumps in the popularity of their talks and the awareness about the goals of the organization. In addition, the TED website has won several Internet awards, including the coveted Webby Award in 2009 for Best Use of Video or Moving Image. To make the TEDTalks even more accessible, there are written translations done by volunteers and even subtitles to go along with the videos. As more people watch the important presentations, it is expected that more will want to get involved in the projects that help improve the world in many different aspects.