(Bad puns are the milk and honey of bashing TED, right?)

The recently departed TED 2008 (February 27 to March 1) was home to a number of fascinating and informative talks. But besides inspiring “ideas worth spreading”, the conference also breathed new life into a long-standing argument. Is TED elitist? Is TED a waste of time? Or worse, more harmful than good?

That last question comes from Umair Haque, who argues that TED “is even more damaging than mere elitism”. Bringing together so many innovators for a closed forum is, at best, neither good nor bad: nothing gets done, but no one is hurt in the process. However, add the opportunity cost of the endeavor, and the conference becomes a waste of time and money.

Let me put it even more sharply. There have been gatherings like TED for hundreds of years. But the vast majority of the world continues to live in bone-crushing poverty, misery, and fear.

Think about that for a second.

That’s an existence proof the size of the Milky Way that stuff like TED isn’t part of the answer - it’s part of the problem. It’s a negative equilibrium: all that great thinking is directed to the place where it’s least productive.

Unfortunately, Haque is liberal with his criticisms, providing no real stepping stone between TED as unproductive and TED as a damaging problem. That the world’s problems exist despite TED speak to its ineffectiveness, not any harmful influence. (Also, I want to call bullshit on Haque for adding a postscript about he is not “bashing” TED. Saying the conference actually contributes to the poor conditions around the world is nothing but bashing.)

However, Haque’s toned-down argument is hardly off base, and he’s not alone in his thinking. Sarah Lacy writes in Business Week why she’s fed up with TED:

This is a sentiment that goes far beyond sour grapes. I care passionately about many of the change-the-world issues discussed at TED. And I am encouraged that next year, the conference is moving from Monterey, Calif., to a larger, more accommodating venue in Long Beach, where the attendee list will be at least a little larger.

Still, I question whether even the loftiest ideas lose some relevance when they’re aired in so rarified an arena. Given how oversold and profitable the conference is, I can’t help but wonder whether there’s a vulnerability that someone else might exploit. Why not a TED for the rest of us? Imagine: a conference that explores the complex fabric of humanity, while actually allowing it in the door.

The biggest problem with TED seems to be how closed its doors really are. If (IF!) you are invited, entry will cost you $6000, a price tag much higher than what many of the people who should be there can reasonably afford. TED reserves 50 seats for people who will pay either $2000 or nothing, but that is 50 out of 1450 attendees! 96.5% of the attendees still pay the entire $6000.

Hating on TED is not a minority activity, either. These arguments have been prominent enough to warrant a Is TED Elitist? page on the TED.com FAQ. I commend TED’s attempts to assuage concerned visitors, but any thoughtful consideration of their response makes the page seem more like a list of reasons detractors are correct.

Why charge so much money?

Without the high fee we wouldn’t spend as much as we do on the conference itself, with state-of-the-art staging, lighting and audiovisual, and generous social events. But even after these expenses the event, is still highly profitable. And we’re delighted it is — because this means we can afford to invest in taking TED’s content free to the world. The process of editing and hosting scores of videos and building a highly trafficked website is expensive. Which is why few other conferences have attempted it on the same scale.

Cutting the price would also impair our ability to fund the TED Prize, expand the TED Fellows program and invest in taking TED into developing countries. And it would turn an already long waiting list into one that was unmanageable.

Firstly, I am all but offended that they would even try to pass off expenses as a reason for the high barrier to entry, and then in the next breath casually mention the high profits (”at least $2 million” every year, by the way). Admittedly, I am wholly ignorant when it comes to the money needed to organize a three-day conference, but this year’s attendance rate of 1,198 should have garnered TED over $7 million from ticket prices alone. Considering that, I am sure that “at least $2 million” figure is very conservative.

And “impairing their ability to fund the TED Prize”? The TED Prize, for those who don’t know, is a $100,000 grant given to three winners each year. So, as it stands now, less than 4% of the profits go toward funding the TED Prize. Where the rest goes, I do not know, but the TED Global conferences are presumably profitable as well, and the website is probably somewhere between $100,000 to $200,000 a year AT MOST.

So the long waiting list is the only excuse that is almost reasonable (though that just brings us full circle to the original complaint). Of course, getting rid of the many actors, actresses, and other useless audience members would make the waiting list more manageable. I love John Cusack to death, but did he really need to be on this year’s list of TED attendees?

It seems foolish to completely disregard the good possible by bringing so many intellectuals together, but the process could definitely do with a lot of improvement. For example, the conference could provide more opportunities for collaboration among attendees, or expand the TED Prize to be either larger or include more winners.

No matter what, though, the conference will remain worthwhile in my eyes as long as TED.com exists. On its own, TED is arguably nothing more than an elitist circle jerk, but the freely available videos will hopefully go a long way to inspiring tomorrow’s innovators.

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