TED
Technology, Education, Design - Ideas Worth Spreading
ONE WISH The TED prize is awarded to an extraordinary individual with a creative and bold vision to spark global change. By leveraging the TED community’s resources and investing $1 million dollars into a powerful idea, the TED Prize supports one wish to inspire the world.
Larry Brilliant “In 1980 we declared the globe free of smallpox. It was the largest campaign in United Nations history until the Iraq war. A hundred and fifty thousand people from all over the world, doctors of every race, religion, culture and nation, who fought side by side, brothers and sisters, with each other, not against each other, in a common cause to make the world better.”
Larry Brilliant’s career path, as unlikely as it is inspirational, has proven worthy of his surname. Trained as a doctor, he was living in a Himalayan monastery in the early 1970s when his guru told him he should help rid the world of smallpox. He joined the World Health Organization’s eradication project, directed efforts to eliminate
the disease in India and eventually presided over the last case of smallpox on the planet. Not content with beating a single disease, he founded the nonprofit Seva Foundation , which has cured more than two million people of blindness in 15 countries (through innovative surgery, self-
sufficient eye care systems, and low-cost manufacturing of intraocular lenses). Outside the medical field, he found time to cofound the legendary online community The Well, and run two public technology companies. Time and WIRED magazines call him a “technology visionary.”
2
1996
167 Days
The Plan Create a nongovernmental, multilingual, worldwide digital surveillance system that monitors the web, global news and social media for phrases and patterns that may signal a brand-new pandemic.
2012
23 Days
Current Status Brilliant shares new data that shows … it’s working. In the 1990s, it took hundreds of days to identify a new potential pandemic. In 2012, he says, that number is down to 23 days. And with advancing technology, the number could go from 23 days to as low as 7 day.
Things you can do
2014
7 Days 3
1.Participate in Flu Near You and join the world’s largest participatory surveillance network 2.Donate to InSTEDD 3.Donate to HealthMap 4.Donate to Seva Foundation
Larry is an MD and MPH, board-certified in preventive medicine. He lived and worked in India for ten years and was on the UN team that led the successful World Health Organization smallpox eradication program. He later founded the Seva Foundation, an international NGO, whose projects have given back sight to nearly 3 million people worldwide through their work to eliminate preventable
Larry was founding chair of the National Bio-
and curable blindness.
Surveillance Advisory Subcommittee, created by Presidential directive, and is a member of the World
In 1985, Larry co-founded The Well, a pioneering
Economic Forum Global Advisory Council on
digital community that holds a special place in
Catastrophic Risks. He was elected to the Council
the history of online communities and he holds a
on Foreign Relations in 2008. He is on the boards of
telecom patent related to online transactions. He was
the Skoll Foundation, Salesforce Foundation and is
a professor of international policy and epidemiology
a frequent speaker and consultant on topics ranging
at the University of Michigan and has authored two
from social action to large scale social change.
books and dozens of scientific articles on infectious diseases, blindness and international health policy.
Recent awards include Time Magazine 100 Most Influential People and top 20 Scientists and Thinkers
He also worked for WHO and UNICEF in polio
(2008), UN Global Leadership Award (2008),
eradication and blindness and volunteered as a
Peacemaker Award (2005) and International Public
physician during several disasters, including the Asian
Health Hero (2004) and two Honorary Doctorates. In
Tsunami in Sri Lanka and Indonesia and the Bihar
2009, the documentary about polio eradication, which
Floods. After the anthrax attacks in the U.S. in 2001,
Larry inspired and was funded by Google.org, The
he volunteered as a first responder for CDC’s bio-
Final Inch, won an Oscar nomination and was bought
terrorism effort.
and shown by HBO. 4
The TED Prize TED is a nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading. It started out in 1984 as a conference bringing together people from three worlds: Technology, Entertainment, Design. Since then its scope has become ever broader. Along with two annual conferences — the TED Conference and TEDGlobal — TED includes the award-winning TED Talks video site, the Open Translation Project and TED Conversations, the inspiring TED Fellows and TEDx programs, and the annual TED Prize. The TED Prize is awarded annually to an exceptional individual who receives $1,000,000 and the TED community’s resources and expertise to spark global change. The Prize begins with a big wish—a wish to inspire thinkers and doers across the globe. From Bono’s the ONE Campaign, ’05 recipient to Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution, ’10 recipient and JR’s Inside Out Project, ’11 recipient , the TED Prize has helped to combat poverty, take on religious intolerance, improve global health, tackle child obesity, advance education, and inspire art around the world.
The Award
The Wish
We award TED Prize winners $1
Imagine an inspiring, high impact idea
Nomination happens two ways:
million to inspire dreamers to think
or dream that needs the support of a
Nominate yourself and make your wish.
bigger about what’s possible. The award
global community to become real. Our
Or nominate someone else, and we’ll
offers support to build a project’s core
winner will have an ambitious wish
ask them for their wish. The TED Prize
infrastructure quickly — so that others
— and the vision, pragmatism and
committee will review all nominations
can add their own collaborative action.
leadership to make it a reality.
and select the winner.
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The Process
www.ted.com/prize