2008 has been one of the most exciting years of my life. I did more dealmaking and met more people than in the last 5 years combined. This produced many surprise insights about business and human nature, especially as I uncovered tons of my own false assumptions.

Here are some of the things I learned and loved in 2008. I’ve linked to posts that I wrote when exploring some of the concepts in more detail…

Favorite reads of 2008: Zorba the Greek and Seneca: Letters from a Stoic. These are two of the most readable books of practical philosophies I’ve ever had the fortune to encounter. If you have to choose one, get Zorba, but Lucius Seneca will take you further. Both are fast reads of 2-3 evenings.

Don’t accept large or costly favors from strangers. This karmic debt will come back to haunt you. If you can’t pass it up, immediately return to karmic neutrality with a gift of your choosing. Repay it before they set the terms for you. Exceptions: ubersuccessful mentors who are making introductions and not laboring on your behalf.

You don’t have to recoup losses the same way you lose them. I own a home in San Jose but moved almost 12 months ago. It’s been empty since, and I’m paying a large mortgage each month. The best part? I don’t care. But this wasn’t always the case. For many months, I felt demoralized as others pressured me to rent it, emphasizing how I was just flushing money away otherwise. Then I realized: you don’t have to make $ back the same way you lose it. If you lose $1,000 at the blackjack table, should you try and recoup it there? Of course not. I don’t want to deal with renters, even with a property management company. The solution: leave the house alone, use it on occasion, and just create incoming revenue elsewhere that would cover the cost of the mortgage through consulting, publishing, etc.

One of the most universal causes of self-doubt and depression: trying to impress people you don’t like. Stressing to impress is fine, but do it for the right people — those whom you want to emulate.

Slow meals = life. From Daniel Gilbert of Harvard to Martin Seligman of Princeton, the “happiness” (self-reported well-being) researchers seem to agree on one thing: meal time with friends and loved ones is a direct predictor of happiness. Have at least one 2-3-hour dinner and/or drinks per week — yes, 2-3 hours — with those who make you smile and feel good. I find the afterglow effect to be greatest and longest with groups of 5 or more. Two times that are conducive to this: Thursday dinners or after-dinner drinks and Sunday brunches.

The two blog posts whose principles I’ve practiced the most in 2008: The Art of Letting Bad Things Happen (from 2007)
; The Choice-Minimal Lifestyle: 6 Formulas for More Output and Less Overwhelm (from 2008)

Adversity doesn’t build character; it reveals it.
(Suggested reading: How to Test-Drive Friends)

Related: Money doesn’t change you; it reveals who you are when you no longer have to be nice.

Total Immersion swimming
(Suggested reading: How I Learned to Swim Effortlessly in 10 Days)

It doesn’t matter how many people don’t get it. What matters is how many people do. If you have a strong informed opinion, don’t keep it to yourself. Try and help people and make the world a better place. If you strive to do anything remotely interesting, just expect a small percentage of the population to always find a way to take it personally. F*ck ‘em. There are no statues erected to critics.

Related: You’re never as bad as they say you are. My agent used to send me every blog or media hit for The 4-Hour Workweek. Eight weeks after publication, I asked him to only forward me positive mentions in major media or factual inaccuracies I needed to respond to. An important correlate: you’re never as good as they say you are, either.

It’s not helpful get a big head or get depressed. The former makes you careless and the latter makes you lethargic. I wanted to have untainted optimism but remain hungry. Speaking of hungry…

Eat a high-protein breakfast within 30 minutes of waking and go for a 10-20-minute walk outside afterward, ideally bouncing a handball or tennis ball. This one habit is better than a handful of Prozac in the morning.
(Suggested reading: The 3-Minute Slow-Carb Breakfast, How to “Peel” Hardboiled Eggs without Peeling)

I dislike losing money about 50x more than I like making it. Why 50x? Logging time as an experiment, I concluded that I often spend at least 50x more time to prevent a hypothetical unit of $100 from being lost vs. earned. The hysterical part is that, even after becoming aware of this bias, it’s hard to prevent the latter response. Therefore, I manipulate the environmental causes of poor responses instead of depending on error-prone self-discipline:

I should not invest in public stocks where I cannot influence outcomes. Once realizing that almost no one can predict risk tolerance and response to losses, I moved all of my investments into fixed-income and cash-like instruments in July 2008 for this reason, setting aside 10% of pre-tax income for angel investments where I can contribute significant UI/design, PR, and corporate partnership help.
(Suggested reading: Rethinking Investing - Part 1, Rethinking Investing - Part 2)

A good question to revisit whenever overwhelmed: Are you having a break-down or a breakthrough?

Rehearse poverty regularly — restrict even moderate expenses for 1-2 weeks and give away 20%+ of minimally-used clothing — so you can think big and take “risks” without fear. (Seneca)

A mindset of scarcity (which breeds jealousy and unethical behavior) is due to a disdain for those things easily obtained. (Seneca)

A small cup of black Kenyan AA coffee with cinnamon on top, no milk or sweeteners.

It’s usually better to keep old resolutions than to make new ones.

Chloe Sevigny. ‘Nuff said.

To bring in a wonderful 2009, I’d like to quote from an email I received today from a mentor of more than a decade:

While many are wringing their hands, I recall the 1970s when we were suffering from an oil shock causing long lines at gas stations, rationing, and 55 MPH speed limits on Federal highways, a recession, very little venture capital ($50 million per year into VC firms), and, what President Jimmy Carter (wearing a sweater while addressing the Nation on TV because he had turned down the heat in the White House) called a “malaise”. It was during those times that two kids without any real college education, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs, started companies that did pretty well. Opportunities abound in bad times as well as good times. In fact, the opportunities are often greater when the conventional wisdom is that everything is going into the toilet.

Well…we’re nearing the end of another great year, and, despite what we read about the outlook for 2009, we can look forward to a New Year filled with opportunities as well as stimulating challenges.

Happy New Year everyone!

Goofing around at a maid cafe in Akihabara, Tokyo. (Photo: David West)

The above video is of my presentation at the Entertainment Gathering, titled “How to Feel Like the Incredible Hulk.” In a short 17 minutes, I explain exactly how I conquered fears of swimming, language learning, and ballroom dancing by questioning “obvious” guidelines and dogmatic teaching.

I explain three approaches (first principles/assumptions, material over method, and implicit vs. explicit) you can immediately apply to your own lifelong goals, or lifelong fears, to become the new-and-improved you in record time in 2009.

This is one of my favorite presentations I’ve ever done. Perhaps because it was so short! Special thanks to Terry Laughlin of Total Immersion for the photographs of swimming biomechanics.

For students of Japanese, the closest equivalent to the featured kanji poster that I could find online is here.

I hope you enjoy the talk as much as I enjoyed giving it!

Other Presentations from the EG

Dozens of presentations were mind-blowing but few are online at this point. Here are two I found hysterical (makes my OCD look normal) and brilliant (makes me look like a knuckle dragger), from Adam Savage of Mythbusters and the superhuman intellect Amory Lovins, respectively:

Before you watch Amory’s video, read this abbreviated bio - I suspect he is also Batman:

Cofounder and CEO of the Rocky Mountain Institute, Amory B. Lovins is a consultant experimental physicist educated at Harvard and Oxford. He has received an Oxford MA (by virtue of being a don), nine honorary doctorates, a MacArthur Fellowship, the Heinz, Lindbergh, Right Livelihood (”Alternative Nobel”), World Technology, and TIME Hero for the Planet awards, the Happold Medal, and the Nissan, Shingo, Mitchell, and Onassis Prizes. His work focuses on transforming the hydrocarbon, automobile, real estate, electricity, water, semiconductor, and several other sectors toward advanced resource productivity. He has briefed eighteen heads of state, held several visiting academic chairs, authored or co-authored twenty-nine books and hundreds of papers, and consulted for scores of industries and governments worldwide. Newsweek has praised him as “one of the Western world’s most influential energy thinkers”; and Car magazine ranked him the twenty-second most powerful person in the global automotive industry.

This video (link) was the end result…

It contains some fantastic visual effects and showcases my aversion for wires. Note: the book fondling was requested by the team, so apologies for the Groundhog Day What About Bob?-type moment.

Most of the gadgets we filmed were edited out or just a blur in a camera pan, so here are a few of the goodies that I showed at home:

Suunto Core wrist-top computer
BonJour laser culinary thermometer for cooking and mischief
Fujitsu ScanSnap travel scanner and Canon SD300 Powershot for capturing documents (I don’t use a fax machine)
Philips noise-canceling headset (the best dollar-for-value noise-canceling headset I’ve found)
Dragon NaturallySpeaking speech-recognition software (Note to Nuance: Mac version, please.)
Sony VAIO VGN-TXN27N/T 11.1″ laptop (no longer available; similar model here) with extended battery and tweaks for 12-hour+ life
17″ MacBook Pro (I don’t use a desktop at home because you can’t “close” a desktop screen for closure and work-life separation)
Victorinox E-Motion 360 4.0 25″ Trek Pack Plus (Trial by Fire winner of this bag to be announced next week!)
Firelite external USB-powered storage for travel and back-ups
Cellphone - LG basic (recently replaced with the LG Chocolate) from Verizon w/ extended battery - I go low-tech here for reasons obvious in my book. I don’t email from a handheld. I have multiple cell phones for overseas use.
Safedrive pocket breathalyzer (I originally bought this to bring to a party; it’s the ultimate conversation piece — “I can beat you!” “No, I can beat both of you!” Use responsibly.)
Sony DreamSystem home entertainment system with 5-DVD changer and surround speakers
Sony Grand WEGA 60″ HDTV-ready widescreen TV
Belkin PureAV power surge protection

These students really busted their asses to get the video done, and it’s a view count and ratings competition, so if you like it, please click here and rate it well! This team flew to SF, shared rooms, pulled all-nighters, and — in my opinion — deserves it. It could be their big break.

What new digital tools or toys can’t you live without at home? Do you have anything that sets you apart, or that provokes “oooh”s and “aaaah”s from friends?

—

Follow Tim’s misadventures and experiments in real-time on Twitter.

Odds and Ends: Victorinox Winner

Thank you all for your patience — and awesome promotion — with the Victorinox Trial by Fire competition! I was totally overwhelmed by the enthusiasm and innovative approaches. I’m humbled and honored to have you as readers. Kick-ass! No word back yet from History Channel on the show, but you’ll be the first to know.

Without further ado: the winner is Mr. Raley, who got the show (and The 4-Hour Workweek) mentioned on the Dennis Miller live radio show with 1.5+ million listeners. The runner-up is Lee Burrell, and an honorable mention goes to Markus for his Facebook campaign. Markus, the .jpg link in the comments wasn’t working!

Many thanks to Charlie Hoehn for helping with selection. Mr. Raley and Lee, please look for an e-mail in your inbox in the next 48 hours.

Thanks again to all, and Happy Holidays to you and yours!

Pavel Tsatsouline, former Soviet Special Forces physical training instructor, has made a name for himself in the world of strength.

He wrote the below article, outlining the simple routine of Russian Master of Sports, Alexander Faleev, for Built magazine, which folded before publication. Pavel contacted me to publish the piece here, and I am pleased to offer it to you as an exclusive.

Though I often suggest training to failure for maximal size gains (see “Geek to Freak: How I Gained 34 lbs. in 4 Weeks”), the pre-failure approach detailed here is excellent for maximal strength development, and the repetitions can be further reduced for relative strength (per-lb. bodyweight) development.

Enter Pavel…

Total read time: 12 minutes.
Read time for routine only: 7 minutes.

Pavel:

I have read a book that has made an impression: The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss.

The 4-Hour Workweek is not a dubious get-rich-quick scheme but a guide to ultimate productivity through ruthless elimination of non-essentials. “Doing less meaningless work, so that you can focus on things of greater personal importance, is NOT laziness,” states the author. “This is hard to accept, because our culture tends to reward personal sacrifice instead of personal productivity. Few people choose to (or are able to) measure the results of their actions and thus measure their contribution in time.”

It is no surprise that Russia has borne a number of Ferriss-type strength and muscle building programs, mercilessly eliminating the non-essentials and delivering extraordinary gains. One is Alexander Faleev’s system that has gained many followers among Russian muscle heads in the last four years.

Comrade Faleev dabbled with powerlifting for seven or eight years, then took a few years off. He poured over years of his training logs looking for what worked and came back to the barbell with a vengeance. In just six months, he reached the coveted Master of Sports level in powerlifting.

Faleev has summed up his approach as “Nothing extra!” In one sentence, it is about doing only four things: the squat, the bench, the deadlift, and competing regularly. That’s it.

The system the Russian had developed for his strength and size breakthrough could have come out of The 4-Hour Workweek. Among Tim Ferriss’ tools for getting the most out of life is Pareto’s law. The essence of the law is that 80% of all results come from 20% of the efforts. Applied to muscle and strength, it means, if most gains will come from the three powerlifts, why waste your time and energy on curls and close-grip benches?

Before I will move on to the nuts and bolts of the training regimen I will address your objections. I can read your mind: “But I am not a powerlifter, and I don’t want to look like one!”

The sport of powerlifting (PL) has an unfair image of refrigerator-sized men whose faces turn red from blood pressure when they bend over to tie their shoes — or rather try to bend over and get stopped by an enormous “uni-ab”. To say that all PLers look like that is akin to stating that all runners are thin and wiry.

Look at photos of powerlifters in lighter weight classes. They are as hard as a rock, and many are ripped — without curls and cable crossovers. Take Texan John Inzer who held the world record in the deadlift for years, 780 pounds at 165 pounds of bodyweight or Ukrainian Oleksandr Kutcher, who recently beat that record with 793 pounds. These guys look more like gymnasts than refrigerators.

Tim: Oleksandr Kutcher pulls a light 694 lbs. and then needs chamomile tea.

Faleev’s 80/20 Routine

5 x 5 Progression:

For beginners, Faleev offers a straightforward progressive overload workout with 5 sets of 8 reps. Eventually you are supposed to advance to 5 x 5. In my opinion, you should go straight to 5 x 5. Sets of five are the meat and potatoes of strength training.

Start with a conservative weight. If you manage five reps in all five sets, next time add 10 pounds and start over. Not 5 pounds, and definitely not 2, but 10. For reasons that are outside of the scope of this article, Malibu Ken and Barbie jumps with tiny plates are a waste of time.

Most likely you will not bag all the fives on your first workout with the new weight. Perhaps you will get 5, 5, 5, 4, 3. No problem, stay with the poundage until you get all 5×5. Your second workout might be 5, 5, 5, 5, 4, and your third of fourth should get you to 5 x 5. Slap on another pair of “nickels” (5-lb. plates) and work your way up to 5 x 5 again. According to Faleev, the above progression will add 110-175 pounds to your max in each of the three powerlifts in one year, provided you are fairly new to the game.

Deadlift 1x per week; Squat and Bench 2x per week

You will be deadlifting once a week and squatting and benching twice a week, once heavy and once light for the latter two. Your light days are for honing technique, not for burning out your muscles with high reps. Do 5 sets of 4 reps (5 x 4) with weights that are 80% of the heavy day’s. For instance, if you did 5 x 5 with 200 on your heavy day, stay with 160 for 5 x 4 on your light day. That’s it! The key to the program’s success is in doing less.

The Russian recommends the following schedule:

Monday –heavy squat (SQ)
Tuesday –heavy benchpress (BP)
Wednesday –heavy deadlift (DL)
Thursday – light SQ
Friday –light BP
Saturday –off
Sunday –off

If training five days is not an option, four will do:

Monday –heavy SQ
Tuesday –heavy BP
Wednesday –heavy DL
Thursday –off
Friday – light SQ, light BP
Saturday –off
Sunday –off

Not ideal, but if you have to cram your training into three days:

Monday – heavy SQ
Tuesday –off
Wednesday –heavy BP, light SQ
Thursday – off
Friday – heavy DL, light BP
Saturday – off
Sunday – off

Failure and Rest Intervals

Never train to failure! Don’t attempt a rep unless you are 100% sure you will make it. Ideally, keep one extra rep in the bank. “Save your strength for the next set,” insists Faleev.

Don’t get greedy.

Practice one lift per workout, stretch, and get out. Faleev stresses that you must wrap up each strength workout with static stretches. “The benefits of stretching are enormous. Stretching can increase your strength by 10%. It is a lot.” The man explains that “when you lift a weight your muscles contract. And after the workout the muscles remain contracted for some time. The following restoration of the muscles’ length is what recovery is. Until the muscle has restored its length, it has not recovered. Hence he who does not stretch his muscles slows down the recuperation process and retards his gains.” Besides, tension and relaxation are the two sides of the same coin, “if the muscle forgets how to lengthen, it will contract more poorly. And that is stagnation of strength.”

Don’t rush your sets.

Do a couple warm-up sets if you must, then feel free to take 5 min. and even more between your work sets. Top power dogs take longer; 30 min. is not unheard of. Power loves rest and does not tolerate rushing. You may feel that you are completely recovered in 2 min. but take a full 5 anyway. According to Faleev, an hour is a good number to shoot for in your workout length.

Balanced Development: Biceps and Other Decorations

One common objection is: “But I will not get a balanced development if do only three exercises! What about my biceps and my…?!”

Faleev sticks to his guns: “For a sharp increase in muscle mass and [strength] results you must do only three exercises: the bench press, the squat, and the deadlift… when you deadlift a 550-pound barbell think what kind of a huge load is born by your biceps, shoulders, traps, and even neck… When you squat with a 550-pound barbell, think about the high pressure the athlete’s abdomen must withstand. An athlete lifting such weights cannot have weak abs by definition –the midsection is strengthened in the process of training the squat. If you bench 330, the muscles of your arms, chest, and the front delts will be so developed, than any bodybuilder will be envious. One must add an interesting detail–in the bench press it is very important to learn to use the lats when starting the bar off the chest. Perhaps someone will think of this as a paradox but the bench press develops the back as well, especially the lats.” Faleev states than the above numbers, a 550-pound squat and deadlift and a 330-pound bench, are “more than achievable” if you focus on these exercises and practice them for years.

And if you have not felt your abs when squatting, it only means you have not squatted heavy enough. “Bodybuilding is a strength sport. Don’t forget it,” admonishes Faleev.

The only legit reason for additional exercises is correction of a dysfunction or imbalance that puts your health at risk. An example would be a pronounced discrepancy in the hamstrings’ flexibility, your knees caving in when you land after a jump, or the failure to activate your butt muscles or “gluteal amnesia”. But diagnosis and correction of such problems is not something you can do on your own or even under the guidance or a personal trainer; you need a specially trained health professional. I suggest that you find one through Gray Cook’s website. Cook is the country’s premier sports physical therapist; in the last Super Bowl both teams were his clients. Get a tune-up from a professional on his team so you can safely focus on the basics and not do stupid things like extra leg curls “to balance out my quads”.

But back to our basics.

Faleev stresses that additional exercises are worse than worthless –- they are harmful because they drain valuable energy that your body could have directed towards spectacular gains in the big three. “…get rid of the excesses and just do what is necessary… When you give up the secondary exercises, you will feel that you are not training enough. You will be leaving the gym totally fresh. This is it, the energy for an increase in the load in the basic lifts. This reserve is what will enable you to ’shoot out of the gate’!”

The above point cannot be emphasized enough; curls, calf raises, and other miscellaneous non-sense may not feel hard but they drain your adaptive energy!

The Fourth Element: Competition and Parkinson’s Law

Focus on the lifts that matter is half of Faleev’s power and muscle equation. Regularly competing in sanctioned power meets is the other half. Faleev observes that with a powerlifting meet date looming on the calendar, many an athlete have accomplished more in six months than others have in many years.

In The 4-Hour Workweek, Tim Ferriss echoes him when he makes use of the Parkinson’s law to get results faster.

According to this law, a task will take as much time as you will allot for it. In other words, you will shine under the pressure of an ambitious deadline. Applied to iron, it means compete, and often! You will be forced to focus on what matters — your squat, your bench, your deadlift –– rather than fool around with what former Coach Powerlifting Team USA Mark Reifkind calls “random acts of variety”. Subscribe to Powerlifting USA magazine on Amazon. Find a meet near you three months away, and go for it! Look for “raw” meets that require that you compete without special squat suits, bench shirts, etc. AAU is one of the federations that hosts raw meets.

As the meet approaches, cut back from 5 x 5 to 4 x 4, 3 x 3, and finally, a couple of weeks before the competition, 2 x 2. Up the poundages accordingly. After the meet, take a week off, then start over with 5 x 5.

Faleev stresses that maxing in the gym is dangerous. Maxing out tests your strength but does not build it. A max workout in the gym amounts to missing a productive 5 x 5 day that you will never get back.

Tim: 5 x 5 isn’t just for beginners: Johnnie Jackson, one of the few champions in both powerlifting and bodybuilding, demonstrates the deadlift. I suggest not slamming the plates. Touch the plates to the floor as if a baby were sleeping in the room.

Faleev offers a formula that will help you estimate your max from your 5 x 5: multiply that weight by 1.2. This is not exact science, but it is much better than those ridiculous charts that claim to calculate your 1 rep max (1RM) from your 10RM.

Just decide what you want: The process of enjoying the pump, the burn, and the variety of exercises? Or muscles and power?

Faleev’s secret of success is so simple, it is easy to ignore: practice nothing but the powerlifts and compete regularly. Period. The Russian muscle man walks into the gym, trains one lift, spends a few minutes stretching, and hits the showers. Done!

Since he dropped all the assistance exercises his progress has been nothing but spectacular. Ironically, his gym buddies who sweat for hours wasting time on meaningless exercises consider him a slacker. He does not care, the wily Russkie has the last laugh with his strength and his mass.

# # #

About the author:

Pavel Tsatsouline is a former Soviet Special Forces physical training instructor, currently a subject matter expert to the US Secret Service, the US Marine Corps, and the US Navy SEALs. Pavel’s bestselling book Power to the People!: Russian Strength Training Secrets has been published in the US and Russia.

In real-time: Follow Tim and his experimentation with Pavel’s methods here.

Live Broadcast by Ustream.TV

Finally!

The debut of my TV show — “Trial by Fire” — will air this Thursday, 12/4, at 11pm ET/PT on The History Channel. It’s been two years in the making.

I’ve been told that the times are 11pm ET, 10pm CST, 9pm MT, and 11pm PST. Double check to be safe on the History Channel schedule.

This could very well be the only time you are able to see this show. It’s a pilot and not guaranteed to become a series, so please tune in and also Tivo!

In this post:

1) The concept
2) Live Q&A following show - join me after the broadcast to ask your questions and learn about how to pitch a TV show, the “reality” behind reality TV, behind-the-scenes details, omitted scenes, and more. The Q&A won’t make sense unless you’ve seen the broadcast.
3) Immediate competition and prize for rallying the troops (sooner is better)

The Concept

The concept is simple: I have one week to attempt to learn what is usually learned over 5-20 years. I either crash and burn — or survive by the skin of my teeth — in a final test (trial by fire) each time.

If it’s made into a series, which depends entirely on viewership numbers on Thursday night, I’ll deconstruct a new complex skill each week. It will show you exactly how I approach learning, and no fake TV drama will be required to make the stakes real.

This episode was shot in HD in Tokyo and the mountains of Nikko, where I rolled the dice on Japanese horseback archery, or yabusame: full gallop, no hands, no safety gear, with wooden poles lining the track on either side of the horse. Please don’t do this at home. I had access to the best in the world, and you’ll get to see some never-before-seen footage of a rare and brutal samurai sport few non-Japanese have ever attempted. The show preview is here.

Live Q&A After Broadcast Thursday

I’ll be holding a live Q&A on this blog after both broadcasts (11pm ET for ET, CST, MT; 11pm PT for PT). Note down questions during the show on things you’d like to know. No-holds-barred. Just keep an eye on this blog and my twitter page for more details.

Immediate Competition to Rally Troops

This is a one shot, one kill affair. To become a series, this show needs massive viewership on Thursday to prove to History Channel that people want more.

The competition, limited to the next 48 hours, is simple: promote the below links and leave a comment here with 1) what you did to spread the word, and 2) what challenge you think I should tackle next.

Some options: Facebook, e-mail, Twitter, blogs, FriendFeed, etc. Bonus points go to people who act sooner vs. later.

The links:
The preview (first choice): http://tr.im/1rak
This post (second choice, if video is removed): http://tr.im/1re6

Prize to best promoter: my favorite travel bag in the world, the $500 retail Victorinox Swiss Army 25″ Trek Pack Plus. I used an older version during my 15-country world trip in 2004, and the latest model is even better.

Thanks in advance for your help with spreading the word! More to come soon! Woohoo!

The Entertainment Group (The EG) is the most incredible weekend gathering you’ve never heard of.

I had no idea what it was 12 months ago, but two unrelated friends — also first-time attendees — raved to me about it in the same week. Once I did the digging, it quickly became the event I most wanted to be part of.

Where else can you sit next to Yo-Yo Ma, Jeff Bezos, and the guys from MythBusters with the breathing room lost at the mega-conferences? Share drinks with the winners of Nobels, MacArthurs, Oscars, and Tonys without the pretension of a white-tie ball? Hang with Mike Rowe of Dirty Jobs while listening to the world’s top dueling pianists?

Now I’m in the mix: I’m speaking on December 12th, most likely on accelerated learning and the quest for elegant skill acquisition.

Founded by Richard Saul Wurman, the mastermind behind TED, to recreate the dream conference, it hosts the most unusual and creative cross-section of inventors, entertainers, artists, scientists, rising stars and living national treasures you could ever imagine… Mike Hawley (MIT Media Lab professor, digital media pioneer, veteran of Lucasfilm, computer inventor with Steve Jobs at NeXT) directs it. And unlike TED, you can actually still get in without filling out an application and soliciting letters of reference.

Just a swipe of your all-powerful credit card while a few spots still remain. It ain’t cheap, but this is one of the few cases where I think it’s worth it. I was planning on attending whether I spoke or not, and I’ve never paid for the other usual suspects in the high-end conference world.

Here are a few of my favorite past EG presentations, from “talks” on the TED website:

Rick Smolan: Natasha’s story
Jonathan Harris: New storytelling tools
Mark Bittman: What’s wrong with what we eat
Kevin Kelly: The next 5,000 days

The EG is where Negroponte launched the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) laptop, Brian Greene gave a crash course in quantum theory, Caleb Chung gave away Pleos. Paul Horowitz told us how he’s actually hunting for little green men. John Underkoffler (the real genius behind the “Minority Report” interface) showed his inventions, Jonathan Harris presented his dazzling web artistry, Pablos Holman showed his terrifying hackery, and Will Wright unveiled SPORE for the very first time.

I’ve been told they’re giving away Chumbys as door prizes this year… but it’s more than just hackers and gadgets.

It is Yo-Yo Ma playing the ‘cello, and Leon Fleisher at the piano, and Jonathan Winters reminiscing about his life. It is Queen Elizabeth’s Royal Calligrapher, Donald Jackson. It’s Minsky, and Mossberg, and Markoff and Myrhvold. It’s also guys like Peter Gelb, who runs the MET Opera in NY showing how they’re now HD-casting La Boheme across the country, which they pretty much have to do seeing as how MacArthur-winning architect Liz Diller has been tearing up Lincoln Center and redesigning it. If you want to jam with Todd Rundgren or Laurie Anderson, wangle a bit part in David Pogue’s next sophomoric tech video, explore King Tut’s Tomb with Zahi Hawass, join the Ringling Brothers Circus with star clown Bello Nock, or have your snapshot taken with Bran Ferren’s 10 *gigapixel* camera, you might want to come to Monterey December 11-13th.

http://the-eg.com
11-13 December
Monterey, California