TED Community » Tiffany Shlain

About Me

Honored by Newsweek as one of the "Women Shaping the 21st Century," Tiffany Shlain is a filmmaker, artist, founder of the Webby Awards, and co-founder of The International Academy of Digital Arts & Sciences. A celebrated thinker and catalyst, Tiffany is known for her ability to illuminate complex ideas in culture, science, technology and life through her unique films, dynamic talks, and innovative projects. She delivered the campus-wide keynote commencement address at UCBerkeley and her films and work have received 50 awards and distinctions including a “Disruptive Innovation Award” from the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival. Her last four films premiered at Sundance, including her 2011 acclaimed feature documentary, Connected: An Autoblogography about Love, Death & Technology, which The New York Times hailed as "Incredibly engaging” and “Examining Everything From the Big Bang to Twitter," and The US State Department just selected as one of the films represent America at embassies around the world for their 2012 American Film Showcase. She is currently working on a film series which is paving the way for a new kind of collaborative filmmaking she and her film studio call CLOUD FILMMAKING. The series, titled Let it Ripple: Mobile Films for Global Change, will include 16 short 2 to 10-minute films over the next 4 years about important aspects of life. Each of these films both invites participants to send in videos from their cell phones and after the film is completed her team them makes free customized versions for non-profits all over the world. The first film in the series, A Declaration of Interdependence, with music by Moby, has been translated into 65 languages and she has made 100 customized versions. The new film in the series just released is Engage which looks at the importance of engaging in society. Please view these both if you are interested in receiving a free customized version for your organization. On Nov. 8th the third film in the series "Brain Power: From Synapses to Hyperlinks," launched at the California Academy of Sciences. It looks at new research on how to best grow children’s brains and applies this to thinking about the best way to grow the global brain of the internet. Brain Power is both a 10 minute film and a TED Book. Tiffany is a Henry Crown Fellow of The Aspen Institute, and member of the advisory board for M.I.T.’s Geospatial Lab, The Institute for the Future and she was invited to advise Secretary State Hillary Clinton about the internet and technology.
www.tiffanyshlain.com twitter @tiffanyshlain

Location:
United States, Mill Valley, CA
Current organization:
The Webby Awards
Past organizations:
The Moxie Institute, Connected the Film, Let it Ripple: Mobile Films for Global Change
Current role:
Film Director
Gender:
Female
Associations:
Henry Crown Fellow of the Aspen Institute
My website links:
Tiffany Shlain Website, Talks, Interviews, & Films by Tiffany, Let it Ripple - Mobile Films for Global Change
Universities:
UC Berkeley
Member Picture

TED Books author

Comments

  • TEDCred score: +1.30 TEDCred reflects your contribution to the TED community.

  • A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: Thank Aja! you are terrific! Very cool way to engage. :)

  • A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: Your brain is not underdeveloped :)*

    This is an unusual format for me too. but loving the interaction and questions.

    Highly recommend you download the book. It's all in threads in there:)*

    I feel like in Cinderella when the carriage is going to turn into a pumpkin in 1 minute! there is only 1 min left for this live Q & A.
  • +1

    A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: good point. i can't wait until video and moving images are really incorporated more into ...well, everything. When you are "with' someone live, half the info you get is from what they say, the other half from body language. We need to use both R & L hemisphere when interacting! I also think they need to add a "Dissimilar to you" button on twitter.
  • +2

    A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: Great question. Both kinds of connections are important. I see this a lot when our "connected the film" facebook community comes to an live event. Nothing replaces the value of real life interaction.

    Even with you. We met on Twitter as we both are interested in the same kind of ideas. Then when I told you I was coming to Europe you tweeted to a conference and made a talk/screening happen and I got to meet you in person. Love that. There needs to be a special word for when you meet someone you have only followed on twitter. I think "Twenchante" would work when we finally meet;)

  • A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: I def. thinking unplugging weekly is very important to try. I promise you will love it.

    And then when we are online, we need to be mindful that everyone we follow is influencing the connections in your brain. So we need to be mindful of who and what ideas and connections we making happen. That's all for us personally..and our minds of course, plug into this larger global collection of minds.

    On that front, I feel very strongly that we need to bridge the digital divide so we can get as many dif. perspectives and wisdom participating in these global conversations.

    People also need to be paying attention to policies that are happening that can be the reshape the global brain in the wrong way. There is a mtg happening (ITU) which is making some major decisions in info flow onilne.. You can watch this video to check out how to understand what is happening and how to get involved. https://make-dev.mozillalabs.com/en-US/projects/roll-your-own-itu-activism-video/

    I know that's a big list. I unpack it more clearly in the TEDBook which i think you would really enjoy reading. (and it has less typos;)
  • +1

    A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: I love that you do them too now. That has been the best part of these films is sharing that i unplug and seeing other people try it. (Everyone, here I recommend trying it!) Do I find it challenging to do ..no. I just have to plan. Now most close friends and family know they can't get in touch with me Friday night to sat. sundown (ish) but everyone adapts and then suddenly you have this day to focus on your family or just yourself...It is good to let your mind go into a dif. mode one day a week. With my kids we are pulling out all sorts of games (a 70's version of CLUE i found in my garage and scrabble.) We spend more time outside. it's all good.
  • +2

    A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: great point. I think as with any technology there are good things and bad.... one good framework when thinking of technology and the internet is that it is just "an extension of us." we are good, bad and everything in between...and as with anything..if you over do it..it's not great. The reason my family and i started doing our weekly unplugging one day a week is because it was 'too much" technology.. I didn't need a neuroscientist to tell me that it wasn't good for my brain..because my head was hurting at night if i was at a screen until i slept. Now i dont' bring the cell phone or my laptop into my bedroom. I need to let my mind unwind. So as much as I LOVE technology and all the new ideas I am exposed to and new people I am connected to, I also know I need to turn it out too.
  • +1

    A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: Definitely related to our film "Connected." The whole new film series "Let it Ripple" is ideas from "Connected" in action. The climax of "connected" asks what is the potential of everyone being online? what can we do with that? (the film also goes into the good, the bad and the potential of all this connectedness and a very personal story interwoven..) you can watch the trailer at www.connectedthefilm.com

  • A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: It's been proven throughout history that innovation occurs when you get the most people from dif. perspectives thinking about a problem. Matt Ridley outlined this beautifully in his book "The Rational Optimist" where he talked about how innovation usually happened in cities where there were the møst folks from dif. backgrounds very close together. The ideal future of the developing internet is when everyone who wants to be online is online, and we have collaborative tools to bring people together from all dif. parts of the world to solve problems. We are just at the beginning of what i feel people will look back as the "Age of Collaboration." That's the "thinking" part of the future i would love...i also believe we are being awash in oxytocin ("love/collaboration/sharing hormone" in the brain) with all these links, clicks, posts, text....i think empathy will only increase as we get more connected...
  • +1

    A reply on Conversation: Live Q&A today at 3:30 Eastern: How is the developing brain of a child like the emerging global brain of the Internet?

    Dec 4 2012: You can just go to our site www.letitripple.org and find out how to easily have one made for your nonprofit for free. We are already making around 25 versions of "Brain Power." Organizations that are interesting in child development, internet policy, education, tech, are all getting them made. It feels so great for our team to make these free films for nonprofits who do such imp. work but often don't have media to get their message out. The nonprofits will then use the film (which looks like it's their film with their call to action, url and logo at the end) for events, fundraising, email campaigns, etc.
Load 10 more Comments (Showing 1 - 10 of 30)

Favorite talks

This member doesn't have any favorite talks yet.