We Should Help Prison Inmates Become Entrepreneurs Upon Their Release

Jeff Smith was once an up-and-coming star in the Missouri State Senate. He went to prison for a year for covering up an election law violation. Since his release, he’s created a new space for himself as a professor, writer, political commentator and advocate for those he was locked up with.

But what Jeff discovered inside wasn’t what he expected — he saw in his fellow inmates boundless ingenuity and business savvy. He asks: Why don’t we tap this entrepreneurial potential to help ex-prisoners contribute to society once they’re back outside? Continue Reading

Video: What SOPA / PIPA Have to Do With Birthday Cakes

What does a bill like the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA) and Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) mean to our shareable world? At the TED offices, Clay Shirky delivers a proper manifesto — a call to defend our freedom to create, discuss, link and share, rather than passively consume.

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Celebrating So-Called Dirty Jobs

Mike Rowe, the host of “Dirty Jobs,” tells some compelling (and horrifying) real-life job stories. Read the transcript or watch the video of his presentation in January 2010 for his insights and observations about the nature of hard work, and how it’s been unjustifiably degraded in society today.

The “Dirty Jobs” crew and I were called to a little town in Colorado, called Craig. It’s only a couple dozen square miles. It’s in the Rockies. And the job in question was sheep rancher.

My role on the show, for those of you who haven’t seen it — it’s pretty simple. I’m an apprentice, and I work with the people who actually do the jobs in question. And my responsibilities are to simply try and keep up and give an honest account of what it’s like to be these people, for one day in their life. The job in question: herding sheep. Great.

We go to Craig and we check in to a hotel and I realize the next day that castration is going to be an absolute part of this work. So, normally, I never do any research at all. But, this is a touchy subject, and I work for the Discovery Channel, and we want to portray accurately whatever it is we do, and we certainly want to do it with a lot of respect for the animals. So I called the Humane Society and I say, “Look, I’m going to be castrating some lambs, Can you tell me the deal?” Continue Reading