Program overview

About TEDActive

TEDActive is an opportunity to let your mind travel the world of ideas while watching the live-hosted TED2012 program in a comfortable, customizable space. When the talks are over, your conversations with other passionate people begin -- a chance to engage in inspiring discussions and projects.

Whatever you’ve been meaning to build, or learn to build, you can. Innovation happens when you tinker, explore and play. These opportunities awaken latent creativity and let you rediscover the joy of making something with your own hands. Attendees can sign up for workshops to learn to use the tools in these spaces or dig in and share skills by leading their own workshops. Think bike repair, hacking, sculpting in cardboard, 3D printing, homebrewing beer and more.

Included in the TEDActive mix are TED leaders from around the world who are helping to foster TED's mission of spreading ideas: Volunteer translators, independent TEDx event organizers, rock-star TED Prize wish contributors and spectacular past TED Fellows. Special events create opportunities for these community members to meet face-to-face and exchange best practices.

A pass to TEDActive costs $3,750.

TEDActive Projects

They are a central element of the TEDActive experience. Attendees sign up early for these projects, and many will invest serious time and thought. People can decide to dive head first into one project or dabble a little bit in several. Attendees will dream up, plan and execute six projects in all. In each case, the TEDActive community will come together around a specific topic or idea, channeling the energy of the group to address hard problems and spark initiatives around ideas shared and discovered at TED. On-site topic experts and facilitators will help advise and move teams toward the goals they establish during online discussions in the weeks leading up to TEDActive. On the ground, they’ll work together to turn those ideas into action.

What attendees say

"[TEDActive is] a conference that seeded ideas and provided a setting populated with participants who cared enough to engage in them, work on them, and possibly even enliven them."
-- David Ng, Educator

"The organizers at TEDActive … created an experience that made me feel more at home than in my own office chair."
-- Ian Bryan, President, Sensible City

"This is no ordinary conference. It stretches you to go where you would likely not go if just browsing the talks on TED.com. Most people listen actively to every single talk. And the beauty comes in the meaning you make for yourself as you listen to talks on a great diversity topics and begin to see patterns; to make connections; to find learning where you might least expect it."
-- Lizzie Crudgington, Learning & Innovation Process Designer

"Leaving Palm Springs; TEDache setting in. Hard to unplug from that electrifying pipeline connected to the heart of humanity. #tedactive"
-- Nancy Giordano, Futurist and TEDxAustin organizer

"I've dubbed TEDActive 'summer camp for the accidental polymath.'"
-- Ross Evans, Founder of Xtracycle

Read more about TEDActive’s home in Palm Springs ...