It’s hard to beat the TED Conferences when it comes to oral storytelling.
It turns out the speakers – or the folks helping the speakers behind the scenes – craft the titles of their talks with the same quest for attention.
Ten of my favorites:
- Do schools kill creativity?
- Greening the ghetto
- Designing the Seattle Central Library (contrarian play … so very dull it gets my attention)
- How a ragtag band created Wikipedia
- The universe is queerer than we can suppose
- What we can learn from spaghetti sauce
- Why do crack dealers still live with their moms.
- Three things to know before you ski to the North Pole
- Why people believe strange things
- Apes that write, start fires and play Pac-Man
The fun with language, juxtaposition of ideas and a touch of zany make for compelling titles.
I didn’t know crack dealers still live with their moms?
I thought this was an Italian thing where it’s common for sons to live at home well into their 30’s.
I know writing the title for a presentation taking place at the Flash Memory Summit doesn’t quite offer the same opportunity, but just trading out one word or phrase for another can make a difference.
If you’d like to check out all 1252 titles for TED talks delivered prior to June, a Google doc captures them all.