The TED prize is given annually to an individual TED thinks is worth $100,000 and a wish to change the world. In past years, recipients have included former President Bill Clinton, writer Karen Armstrong and environmentalist Sylvia Earle.
This year, for the first time, the TED prize is going not to an individual, but to an idea, The City 2.0. Essentially, TED’s idea is that we on planet Earth should work with what we already have, rather than expanding and developing more land:
The City 2.0 is the city of the future … a future in which more than ten billion people on planet Earth must somehow live sustainably.
The City 2.0 is not a sterile utopian dream, but a real-world upgrade tapping into humanity’s collective wisdom.
The City 2.0 promotes innovation, education, culture and economic opportunity.
The City 2.0 reduces the carbon footprint of its occupants, facilitates smaller families and eases the environmental pressure on the world’s rural areas.
The City 2.0 is a place of beauty, wonder, excitement, inclusion, diversity, life.
The City 2.0 is the city that works.
The TED blog says the prize money for The City 2.0 will go to “visionary individuals around the world who are advocating on its behalf.” As for the wish part, TED is collecting those here.
(Image: Sprawl, by Mark Strozier/Flickr)
