And we're all repeating that they take the stage

What is the common point between Bill Gates, Julian Assange, Philippe Starck, Peter Gabriel, Richard Branson or Frank Gehry All, as hundreds of technology specialists, business leaders, designers and scientists in all fields, a day took the floor at a TED Conference (for "technology, entertainment, design"). Launched there is a quarter of a century in California, these conferences have made the competitors around the world thanks in part to the Internet. The main French, TEDx Paris, will take place this Saturday at the Pierre Cardin space, and will take place at sold-out: some 800 places available, on sale end of September at an average price of 80 euros, are extracted in a few minutes.

A tower of force then the French event is in its second public Edition and that the list of speakers was not even communicated. "It is a willingness on our part, explains Michel Lévy-Provençal, President of the association of ideas to change the world, organizing TEDx Paris.". The idea is to leave some surprises in the room and to avoid the public Vienna for one intervention and reparte after.

On the twenty players post-Kyoto on stage, only two names are already known: Pierre Rabhi, organic farming pioneer and champion of the "happy sobriety", and the science fiction writer Bernard Werber, known for his best-selling "the ants". The casting and the principle of this Parisian Edition are based on the model of the Californian TED: together on the same theme (this year in Paris: "And if it changed") backgrounds various, well-known or little-known people, who have in common to promote emerging ideas - whether to present new tools for education, show unpublished human-machine interfaces or explain how the insects could one day feed humanity.

Whatever their notoriety, stakeholders have carte blanche to expose their ideas for a quarter of an hour - very specifically for eighteen minutes maximum. The immutable rule of the first edition of TED, in January 1984 in Palo Alto (California) - its founder, Richard Saul Wurman, felt that beyond it was impossible to hold the attention of the public. "It happened twice to me out of stage one speaker who had exceeded the time imposed", says Bruno Giussani, European Director and member of the Central Directorate of TED. Beyond the anecdote, this rule is important for the pace of the lectures.

Because one of the peculiarities of TED is to make each speech a little show, carefully repeated with the help of the organizers. "Conferences held in a real Theatre, with an effort of setting, for preparing and staging, explains Bruno Giussani." I will talk about ten times with a guest to prepare its passage. And we're all repeating that they take the stage.

Upon arrival, interventions are a far cry conferences and the traditional "keynotes". This way of film, or of scientists and intellectuals of the creators "and the rock stars" - dixit Bruno Giussani-a much to the success of TED on the canvas. Because California conferences, reserved to a few hundreds of privileged able to pay several thousand dollars, at the outset have become a phenomenon on the Internet. Available for free on the TED site since 2006, they have been seen more than 375 million times.

This change of strategy goes back to the redemption of TED in 2002 by Chris Anderson. This journalist, creator of the magazine "Business 2.0" in the United States, has made private enterprise Foundation non-profit funded by sales of tickets and the sponsors. "The purpose is to disseminate new ideas by a maximum of channels, because progress comes from the circulation of ideas," explains Bruno Giussani. Since then, TED has turned into the multiple ramifications organization: since 2005, a second event, TEDGlobal, is held at the United Kingdom, a prize is awarded each year. And, against all odds, free online interventions, since 2006, has not discouraged the paying public: to 6,000 dollars room, spaces for TED2011, which will take place from 28 February to 4 March in California, are all sold since almost a year.