Monday, August 25, 2008

Places Worth Caring About

A couple days ago James Howard Kunstler overwhelmingly won my "What Should I Blog Next?" contest. Today begins a multi-part JHK post.

On July 17 I posted about participating in a citizen's committee related to transportation planning. cHiggins, who blogs at It's Just A Ride, pointed me to a Kunstler TED Talk. The MinusCar Project loves the TED Talks.

I don’t read much JHK because I find his stuff to be too dark to consume in large quantities. Paradoxically, what I have read I really like. His novel “World Made By Hand” sits on my nightstand. This TED Talk contains plenty of the curmudgeon I expect but he also makes me laugh way more than I expect too.

JHK is not without controversy or over exposure. Toward the end (6:00 to go) of the talk he says something like “Chris asked me not to go on very long about this…” He’s talking about the “end of the cheap oil era” – and I imagine he suffers from people thinking “we’ve heard this already, move along. Say something new.”

It’s 20 minutes long.

Enjoy.

3 comments:

Peter said...

i think it's more because BMW is the sponsor of the event.

mytzpyk said...

I'm not sure it's the right decision for the guy to refuse to give this presentation because the sponsor is disagreeable.

Or maybe it works in reverse, maybe BMW loses cred because JHK presented at it's event?

"I'd never drive a BMW. They're always supporting stuff that's counterproductive to itself."

The Woulfes said...

I agree with you about TED Talks. It's nice to have so many great speakers available at the click of a mouse.