Speak to me

Critics have been predicting the death of the public lecture ever since Johannes Gutenberg got his printing press going in 1450. Why bother negotiating the market-day crowds in downtown Mainz to hear someone read from the Bible, when you can sit by the fire in your parlour and read your own copy? The same argument was made ad nauseum about the internet when it first kicked off: who on earth will bother trotting off to an expensive talk when you can see and hear the best lecturers in the world on your computer for free? TED, an American website, offers...