TEDx and the Power of Sharing Ideas

If you share a passion for ideas or are simply looking for inspiration, you have to attend a TEDx event like I did last weekend.

What is TEDx?

In the spirit of Ideas Worth Spreading, TED has created a program called TEDx, a program of local, self-organized events that brings people together to share a TED-like experience.

So who's TED?

TED isn't a person. TED is a nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. It started out as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design. Since then its scope has become ever broader. Along with two annual conferences -- the TED Conference in Long Beach and Palm Springs each spring, and the TEDGlobal conference in Edinburgh UK each summer -- TED includes the award-winning TEDTalks video site, the Open Translation Project and TED Conversations, the inspiring TED Fellows and TEDx programs, and the annual TED Prize.

Still confused?

Perhaps, watching a TED Talk video will flesh it all out...

still not convinced?

When you attend a TED event, not only do you get to listen to incredible ideas and inspirational stories but you also have the opportunity to discuss your own with like minded individuals.

The fact that TEDxVictoria was sold out and included so many youth, gives me faith that our future is in good hands.

TED is a great start at inspiring the masses and starting the conversation but how do we turn those ideas and inspirations into reality?

This is where I hope the Hub comes into the picture.

The Hub identifies itself as a social enterprise with the ambition to inspire and support imaginative and enterprising initiatives for a better world. The Hub is a global community of people from every profession, background and culture working at 'new frontiers' to tackle the world's most pressing social, cultural and environmental challenges. It believes that there is no absence of good ideas in the world.  Couldn't agree more!

The Hub believes the problem is a crisis of access, scale, resources and impact. So it felt vital to create places around the world for accessing space, resources, connections, knowledge, experience and investment. The Hub has been working across five continents to create places for people who change things. This is the ambition. The Hub set out to create places that borrow from the best of a member's club, an innovation agency, a serviced office and a think-tank to create a very different kind of innovation environment. Places with all the tools and trimmings needed to grow and develop new ventures. Places to access experience, knowledge, finance and markets. And above all, places for experience and encounter, full of diverse people doing amazing things. These places are called Hubs, and Hub Ottawa is set to open very soon.

Hopefully word gets out on initiatives like TED and Hubs, and we turn more great ideas and thoughts into reality.

Salmon Run

One of the many perks to living in Victoria is being able to witness a very interesting natural phenomenon as salmon return to Goldstream Provincial Park, only 16km away from the provincial capital. After the fuel spill earlier in the year, there was uncertainty if the salmon would return but luckily some did.


It seems as though I was a bit late in witnessing the salmon run in all its exciting glory this year but it was still very interesting to watch nature - perseverance, sex, and death - in its rawest form just a few feet away.

Borrowing the words of one of the Park's interpretative signs:


From October to December, Goldstream Provincial Park is host to one of nature's most fascinating spectacles. It begins when three species of Pacific salmon, compelled by an irresistible urge to forsake the rich feeding grounds of the Pacific coast, return to this stream to spawn a new generation.

Upon reaching the spawning grounds, male chum develop large hooked jaws with dog-like teeth, and purplish bars along their sides. Females develop a dark stripe. The female selects a patch of gravel and is joined by males who fight continuously to be near her. Males moves back and forth, occasionally quivering over her back.

The female digs a redd (a series of nests) in the gravel by turning on her side and thrashing her tail along the stream bottom, causing rocks to be lifted and carried downstream by the current. Testing the depth with her anal fin, she continues to dig until the nest has reach the right depth - as deep as half a metre.

The female releases about 400 eggs into the nest to be fertilized simultaneously by milt from the male. Time is critical because once the eggs swell and harden, they can no longer be fertilized. The female then moves upstream to dig a new nest. This excavation covers the deposited eggs just downstream. The process continues until about 3,000 eggs have been laid.

Males may leave the redd site to look for another egg-bearing female but the female remains to prevent others from claiming the territory and digging up her eggs. Weakened and battered, both males and females are dead within 10 days of entering the stream. 

A new generation of salmon now lies under the gravel, awaiting its own battle for survival.