Really honoured to be asked to do another TED talk, back at the UK’s premier TEDx event in Exeter. I spoke there on piracy and the renewal of the commons back in 2013 and – though performing without notes is terrifying – absolutely loved the whole thing.
This year’s event is around the theme of ‘hope,’ and what I’m hoping to do (boom boom) is use some of the research from Getting High to look at ‘creating new Summers of Love in dark times.’
It’s 50 years since those now-mythical months of 1967, and what fascinates me is the parallels to our times now: a bloody civil rights struggle, trigger-happy police, mass protest, distrust of mainstream politics… and technologies of lift hoping to fly people to other celestial bodies.
It was hippies then, and it’s hipsters now, but I want to offer some thoughts on how a more grounded hope might be generated, one that refuses to look upwards, but acts in the horizontal.
The event sold out in about 15 mins, so no more tickets to be there in person I’m afraid, but if I don’t make a total fool of myself (or if I *really* do) I’ll post a link to the video when I have it.