经济学人下载:重塑创意产业的TED

Business
商业报道

Schumpeter
熊彼得

Ideas reinvenTED
重塑创意产业的TED

TED has revolutionised the ideas industry, in part by putting old wine in new bottles
旧瓶装新酒，TED颠覆创意产业

THE first TED conference in 1984 was such a damp squib that the organisers did not hold a second one for six years.
1984年的第一次TED大会办得非常失败，以至于其组织者6年后才举办第二场。

Today TED is the Goliath of the ideas industry.
而如今的TED是创业行业的龙头企业。

The heart of the enterprise is TED's twice-yearly conference at which big ideas are presented in short, punchy talks.
TED的核心产品就是两年一届的TED大会，大会由一些呈现优秀思想的短小精悍的演讲组成。

On March 17th-21st，
今年3月17-21日，

around 1,200 TEDsters will gather in Vancouver to listen to the likes of Bill Gates and Nicholas Negroponte celebrating TED's 30th birthday and thinking great thoughts.
将会约有1200TED爱好者聚集到温哥华庆祝TED成立30周年，届时会有像比尔·盖茨或尼古拉斯·尼葛洛庞帝这样的人物来分享一些伟大的思想。

The conference has also spawned an array of businesses, albeit not-for-profit ones.
TED大会也催生出了一系列的企业，其中也不乏一些非盈利性的企业。

The organisation has built an electronic warehouse of more than 1,700 previous talks, at TED.com.
TED在其网站TED.com上建立了一个电子仓库，储存了1700多长以往的演讲视频。

These are free to view and, so far, they have been watched nearly 2 billion times.
迄今为止，这些免费的视频已经被观看了将近200万次。

It has generated a mass movement:
TED还催生了一个大规模活动：

volunteers have put on more than 9,000 TED-like events called TEDx in 150 or so countries since 2009.
自2009年以来，来自150多个国家的志愿者举行了超过9000场类似TED，他们自己称之为TEDx的活动。

It has established a TED prize, a TED fellowship programme and a line of TED e-books.
TED还设立了一个TED奖，TED奖学金计划和一个电子书计划。它同时也成为了世界上重要的造星工场：

And it has become a central part of the world's star-making machinery:
一旦被受邀至TED演讲，一个名不见经传的学者可以变身学界明星，

an invitation to speak at TED can turn an obscure academic into a superstar guru and a struggling journalist into a celebrated writer.
一个艰难谋生的小记者也可能成为知名作家。

Such success has inevitably produced a backlash.
如此巨大的成功自然会招来强烈的抵制。

Critics dismiss TED as the Starbucks of intellectual life.
批评者对TED嗤之以鼻，把它称作知识生活中的星巴克。

Evgeny Morozov, a technology pundit, says it has become something ludicrous, and a little sinister.
尤金·摩洛所夫，一位科技界的公共权威，说TED已经变成了一个荒唐荒唐可笑，有点邪乎的东西。

Benjamin Bratton, a sociologist, goes further and suggests that TED is a recipe for civilisational disaster.
社会学家本杰明·布莱顿则说TED会造成文明世界的灾难，

In his view TED really stands for middlebrow, megachurch infotainment.
在他看来，TED实际上代表的是通俗，大教派，资讯娱乐。

The Onion, a satirical website, has produced a series of Onion talks including A future where all robots have penises.
讽刺网站《洋葱报》制作了一系列洋葱脱口秀，其中一期名为在未来，每个机器人都会有‘铅笔'。

There is certainly some truth in these criticisms:
这些批评也不是全无道理：

any organisation that invites Sting to its 30th birthday party is in danger of jumping the shark.
任何一个邀请斯汀参加其三十周年庆典的组织都可能会有走下坡路的危险。

But criticism must be tempered by admiration for what TED has achieved.
但是，那些对于TED所取得成就的赞誉中和了这些批评。

It does indeed have a weakness for celebrities.
的确，TED很钟爱名人，

But it has also discovered hundreds of lights hidden under bushels:
但它也发掘了大量被埋没的人才 ：

the most viewed TED video, with 25m downloads, features Ken Robinson, a once-obscure British educationalist.
被观看次数最多的，下载量高达2500万次的TED视频的主角，便是一个一度默默无闻的教育家肯·罗宾逊。

It is true that TED shrinks big ideas into bite-like chunks.
虽然TED把一些的宏大思想都极度压缩了，

But it has also demonstrated that there is a huge market for big ideas.
但它也证明了这些思想具有巨大的市场。

TED is the perfect example of the power of disruptive innovation.
TED可以说是破坏式创新的典范：

The ideas business was already overcrowded when it began to flex its muscles.
当TED崭露头角的时候，创意行业的市场已然饱和。

The BBC rejected an early TED talk on the ground that it was too intellectual.
BBC曾拒绝转播早期TED的现场演讲，理由是其太过深奥。

But TED has rewritten the rules.
但是，TED现在已经更改了规则。

Conference regulars compare the corporate pabulum that they are served at Davos with the intellectual sustenance they receive at TED.
TED大会的常客们拿达沃斯论坛和TED做对比，他们说前者提供的企业方面的内容简单乏味，而TED提供的才是有用的精神食粮。

Businesses now hire it to run their in-house conferences.
现在，企业会雇TED帮助其举办内部会议，

Publishers compete to sign up its speakers.
出版商也竞相与TED的演讲者签约。

TED has done more to advance the art of lecturing in a decade than Oxford University has done in a thousand years.
在革新演讲艺术方面，TED在十年内做出的贡献，比牛津大学一千以年来做出的更大。

The man at the heart of this disruption is Chris Anderson, a journalist turned entrepreneur who calls himself TED's curator.
曾经是一名新闻工作者的克里斯·安德森便是这场创新运动的核心人物，他称自己是TED的守护人。

Mr Anderson made his money publishing computer and business magazines.
安德森通过出版计算机和商业杂志积累了财富。

He bought TED in 2001 and set about turning a cult conference into a multimedia phenomenon,
他在2001年买下了TED并在那时就开始将这个小众的集会转变为一种媒体现象。

by bringing together the two worlds that he knew best:
在此过程中他把他最熟悉的两个领域的知识。

the journalistic one of storytelling and the high-tech world of disruptive change.
新闻界的的讲故事的技巧和科技界的破坏式创新的理念结合了起来。

And he provided TED with both a powerful business model and a pipeline of polished output.
他还在为TED创造一个强大商业模式的同时，也建立了一个输出高质内容的渠道。

TED uses a shrewd combination of paid-for and free products, the purpose of the latter being to generate buzz.
TED巧妙地将付费和免费结合在了一起，这也造成了近来的轰动效应。

Tickets to its five-day conferences cost at least $6,000.
如果要买下一场为期五天的TED大会的所有门票，你至少得花6000美元。

It sells an ever-growing array of TED-branded products.
TED的产品线还在日益增长。

But it has also been generous with its intellectual capital，
但是TED对待其知识资产却是毫不吝啬，

not only giving away videos on the internet but also granting licences to enthusiasts to stage TEDx events.
它不仅在网上免费发布它的视频，还为TED的狂热爱好者举行的TEDx颁发许可。

To ensure quality it sends all speakers a stone tablet engraved with the TED Commandments, starting with:
为保证演讲的质量，TED给其演讲者都定下了TED戒律，第一条便是

Thou shalt not simply trot out thy usual schtick.
勿施黔驴之技。

Talks must last for just 18 minutes—Long enough to be serious and short enough to hold people's attention, as Mr Anderson puts it.
安德森规定演讲的长度不能超过18分钟既足够用来讲严肃的问题，也至于太长使人厌烦。

Potential speakers are carefully auditioned and extensively trained—and subtly reminded that only successful talks will be put online.
被精心挑选出的演讲者会接受多方面的训练，并被暗示说只有成功的演讲视频才会被发布。

TED is constantly striving to improve its products and expand its pipeline.
TED在努力不断提升产品的品质和并扩宽来源渠道。

It has invested heavily in camera crews and stagecraft.
它在摄影和舞台技术方面已经投入了大量资金。

It has experimented with shorter formats such as TED in three minutes.
它还试验了缩短般的三分钟TED。

It has even introduced an American Idol element:
它甚至引入了美国偶像的元素：

about half of the speakers at each conference are chosen by competitive auditions that take place all over the world and are theoretically open to anyone.
有将近一半的演讲者是通过全球海选的形式挑选的，理论上所有人都能参加这个选拔。

Modern-day missionaries
现代传教士

TED has become the leading ideas festival of the digital world.
TED已经成为数字世界最重要的思想盛会。

It draws much of its audience as well as many of its star speakers from the technocracy.
它的观众和演讲者很多都来技术专家政治群体。

It champions tech solutions to problems:
它赞成用科技手段解决问题：

its talks tend to give the impression that there is no ill in the world that cannot be solved with a laptop and an internet connection.
许多演讲都给人一种这样的印象：世界上没有什么问题是计算机和互联网解决不了的。

But there is also something old-fashioned about it.
但是TED也有传统的一面。

TED meetings have a revivalist feel,
TED的集会给人一种像是宗教复兴运动的感觉：

from the preacher's promises of salvation to the happy-clappy congregation.
演讲者像布道者一样给出救赎的承诺，观众们则像一群狂热的教众。

It is revealing that Mr Anderson is the son of missionaries, and, in rather Victorian fashion,
克里斯·安德森是一名传教士的儿子，而且极具维多利亚时期风格的是，

grew up in India before going to Oxford.
他在印度长大，后来又上了牛津大学。

TEDsters can also sound like modern versions of Dale Carnegie, the author of The Art of Public Speaking and How to Win Friends and Influence People.
TED的演讲则也像是现代版本的戴尔·卡耐基，此人是《演讲的艺术》和《人性的弱点》的作者。

A striking number of TED talks preach that you can have it all, a great career and a fulfilled life, if only you work hard and follow your passion.
大量的TED演讲都宣扬，只要你努力工作并追随自己的激情，你就可以同时工作和生活的双丰收。

The ultimate secret of TED's success is not its commitment to disruptive innovation but its ability to repackage old-time religion for the digital age.
TED成功的奥秘并不是它恪守了破坏性创新的理念，而是它把旧时的宗教重新包装，使之适应数字时代。