TED offered a vision of the world where complex societal issues could be solved with a lightbulb moment and a well-designed PowerPoint presentation. 

Climate change? There's an app for that. 

Poverty? A social entrepreneur with a TED talk has it figured out. 

It was a worldview that flattered millennials' sense of ourselves as changemakers while conveniently ignoring the systemic barriers to real change.

TED offered a vision of the world where complex societal issues could be solved with a lightbulb moment and a well-designed PowerPoint presentation. 

Climate change? There's an app for that. 

Poverty? A social entrepreneur with a TED talk has it figured out. 

It was a worldview that flattered millennials' sense of ourselves as changemakers while conveniently ignoring the systemic barriers to real change.

https://www.joanwestenberg.com/ted-talks-the-picotop-of-millennial-pop-intellectualism

I write about tech + humans + philosophy. Skeptical tech optimist, EA aligned, building internet businesses.

Farcaster OG.

https://linktr.ee/joanwestenberg

Was on a crew for one TEDx event… was setup as virtue signal entertainment; also a great hack by the parent org to get us all to volunteer while they took in ticket rev