Seth Godin is an entrepreneur and prolific business-book author who specializes in marketing in the digital age. 

In a world of too many options and too little time, our obvious choice is to just ignore the ordinary stuff.  Godin spells out why, when it comes to getting our attention, bad or bizarre ideas are more successful than boring ones.   more

Amy Tan is the author of such beloved books as The Joy Luck Club, The Kitchen God's Wife and The Hundred Secret Senses. 

She digs deep into the creative process, looking for hints of how hers evolved revisiting her childhood, sharing her family history and delving into the worlds of physics and chance. It’s a wild ride with a surprise ending.  more

Clay Shirky, a prescient voice on the Internet’s effects, argues that emerging technologies enabling loose collaboration will change the way our society works. 

In this talk, Shirky shows how closed groups and companies will give way to looser networks where small contributors have big roles and fluid cooperation replaces rigid planning.   more

Richard Branson bootstrapped his way from record-shop owner to head of the Virgin empire. Now he's focusing his boundless energy on saving our environment.

In this talk he discusses the ups and the downs of his career, from his multibillionaire success to his multiple near-death experiences -- and reveals some of his (very surprising) motivations.   more

Sergey Brin and Larry Page co-founded Google in 1998, and redefined the way people use the web.

In this talk, they offer a peek inside the Google machine, sharing tidbits about international search patterns, the philanthropic Google Foundation, and the company's dedication to innovation and employee happiness.   more

Malcolm Gladwell is a deft lateral thinker, detective of fads and emerging subcultures and chronicler of jobs-you-never-knew-existed. 

Tipping Point author, Gladwell gets inside the food industry's pursuit of the perfect spaghetti sauce -- and makes a larger argument about the nature of choice and happiness.   more

Robin Chase founded Zipcar, the world’s biggest car-sharing business. That was one of her smaller ideas. With Zipcar, she turned the concept of car-sharing -- and carbon-saving while you're at it -- into a reality and even a full-blown trend.

In this talk, she travels much farther, contemplating road-pricing schemes that will shake up our driving habits and a mesh network vast as the Interstate.  more