TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It is a set of meetings, held in various (不同的) cities around the world every year. TED meetings invite speakers to give reports on different topics. The speakers are from different parts of the world. They are usually experts in their fields and talk about new ideas and recent developments that are important to their work. The speakers are often also well-known with people such as Microsoft giant Bill Gates and the world-famous expert, Jane Good all, having given talks. There are many talks on environment and international development, aid work, and how to help poor people with all kinds of new ideas. There are also a number of talks about education and education reform (改革).

    As the talks cover a wide variety of topics, all speakers have a strict time limit — each report must last no longer than 18 minutes.

    Like all organizations, however, TED has had its downs as well as ups. Some people think the organization is turning intelligent members of the scientific and other communities into entertainers (表演者). What else, those who attend must be very privileged (有特权的) with tickets for TED events costing about $ 6,000 (or more).

    However, www.ted.com, the organization's website can make many great talks becomeaccessibleto everybody who has an Internet connection. Every weekday, a new video is uploaded (更新) from a TED event, allowing people around the world to listen to the talks for free. At only 18 minutes, even if the video is not that interesting, you know you are not going to waste too much time.

Most TED talks are in English but there are talks available in other languages, too. As a result, the site is excellent for practicing English and learning new vocabulary, especially in a topic that you find interesting and enjoyable.