Gawker: valleywag, ted's chris anderson

TED's Chris Anderson invites Kevin Rose, assuring his conference's irrelevance

Owen Thomas — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 17:00:00 EDT

Has TED organizer Chris Anderson lost his senses? He has invited Digg founder Kevin Rose to TED 2009 — an honor Rose announced on Twitter in hackerspeak. (If you're a regular TED attendee, you may not know that "woot" is an exclamation of excitement; spelling it with numbers is supposed to make it more impressive.) With the arrival of Rose and teenage wantrepreneur Jessica Mah, more TED oldtimers are sure to flee the annual Valley-meets-Hollywood schmoozefest.

Who wants to hang around with a guy best known for drinking beer on camera while discussing tech news, and a 17-year-old whose chosen profession is talking about startups and going to conferences? For all its tiresome, self-congratulatory puffery, TED at least offered tech veterans a respite from the Web 2.0 cool-kids crowd. Next year, we won't have to bother publishing TED's attendee list: We'll just copy it straight from the list of top Twitter users, as Anderson seems to be doing.

TED website makes its source code another idea worth spreading

Owen Thomas — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 18:20:07 EST

The TED conference is over, leaving uninvited tech journalists with 51 weeks to find something else to complain about. Its favored attendees are no doubt reminiscing about rubbing shoulders with John Cusack, Jeff Bezos, and Marissa Mayer's boyfriend. But this year's TED left another memory — its website source code. 9rules cofounder Mike Rundle says the failure exposed a database password, among other things. A suggestion for TED organizer Chris Anderson: Instead of complaining about having your attendee list published, why not make sure your website is secure?

Why the TED list is troubling

Owen Thomas — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 13:00:15 EST

Chris Anderson, the organizer of the TED conference, has complained, not to me, not to my boss, but to my boss's boss about our publishing the complete list of his 1,198 attendees. Anderson — not to be confused with the Chris Anderson who edits Wired — finds it "troubling." What we find troubling is the list itself. Fine, it's daubed with Hollywood starlets; they're part of the draw. But why is Zack Bogue, an undistinguished real-estate fund manager, there? Presumably because of his connection with Google's Marissa Mayer. But come on. According to San Francisco's infamous "Googirl" profile, the two aren't even officially dating. That's right: You can get into TED as someone's plus-one.

Mayer's mother, too, is attending. And then count the number of Bezoses whose first name isn't "Jeff" on the list. That's just for starters. Surely one of these people could have been bumped to make room for TechCrunch editor Michael Arrington, who is distraught over his exclusion.

Because we've published the list, you can judge for yourself Anderson's skills at assembling a conference crowd. What troubling examples of nepotism can you find?