Sebastian Wernicke: 1000 TEDTalks, 6 words

Translator: Xun Lin Reviewer: Yihan Zhou

There's currently over a thousand TED Talks on the TED website.

喺 TED 嘅網站入邊 一共有超過一千個演講

And I guess many of you here think that this is quite fantastic,

我諗你哋多數都會覺得

好勁啊！

except for me, I don't agree with this.

但係我就唔係咁諗

I think we have a situation here.

我覺得依個係一個難題

Because if you think about it, 1,000 TED Talks,

因為你諗下，一千個演講意味著

that's over 1,000 ideas worth spreading.

有超過一千個諗法值得我哋傳播

邊有可能

How on earth are you going to spread a thousand ideas?

傳播依一千個諗法？

Even if you just try to get all of those ideas into your head

就算你諗住睇曬依一千條片

將所有嘢塞入你個腦

by watching all those thousand TED videos,

你都需要

it would actually currently take you over 250 hours to do so.

超過 250 個鐘

And I did a little calculation of this.

我就計咗條數

每睇一條片造成嘅經濟損失大概係

The damage to the economy for each one who does this is around $15,000.

一萬五千美金

So having seen this danger to the economy,

既然佢會引起咁嘅經濟損失

I thought, we need to find a solution to this problem.

我就諗我哋需要一個解决措施

Here's my approach to it all.

跟住我會講下我嘅做法

If you look at the current situation, you have a thousand TED Talks.

觀望現實情況

有一千個演講

Each of those TED Talks has an average length of about 2,300 words.

每個演講嘅平均長度係

約 2,300 個英文字

Now take this together, and you end up with 2.3 million words of TED Talks,

計下個總數

所有演講加起身一共有 230 萬個英文字

which is about three Bibles-worth of content.

係《聖經》嘅三倍

(Laughter)

The obvious question here is, does a TED Talk really need 2,300 words?

問題就係

一個演講真係需要 2,300 字咩？

Isn't there something shorter?

可唔可以短啲啊？

I mean, if you have an idea worth spreading,

如果你想宣揚你嘅諗法

你絕對可以將佢縮到短過 2,300 字

surely you can put it into something shorter than 2,300 words.

The only question is, how short can you get?

唯一嘅問題係可以縮到幾短啊？

What's the minimum amount of words you would need to do a TED Talk?

一個演講你最少需要幾個英文字呢？

我諗緊依個問題嘅時候

While I was pondering this question,

I came across this urban legend about Ernest Hemingway,

傳奇作家海明威出現喺我腦海

佢曾經講過依六個英文字

who allegedly said that these six words here:

For sale: baby shoes, never worn （譯︰全新嬰兒鞋出售）

"For sale: baby shoes, never worn,"

係佢寫過最好嘅小說

were the best novel he had ever written.

And I also encountered a project called Six-Word Memoirs

我仲見過一個「六字傳記」計劃

where people were asked, take your whole life

所有人都用六個英文字總結佢哋嘅生平

and please sum this up into six words, such as these here:

譬如：

「搵到真愛，卻同另一個結緍。」

"Found true love, married someone else."

Or "Living in existential vacuum; it sucks."

「生活空虛，好弊。」

I actually like that one.

——我好鐘意第二個

So if a novel can be put into six words

如果一篇小說可以濃縮成六個英文字

and a whole memoir can be put into six words,

人嘅一生可以用六個英文字黎總結

you don't need more than six words for a TED Talk.

咁一個演講都只需要六個英文字

We could have been done by lunch here.

中午飯之前就可以聽曬 今日所有演講喇！

（笑聲）

(Laughter)

And if you did this for all thousand TED Talks,

如果將所有演講進行濃縮

you would get from 2.3 million words down to 6,000.

就可以由 230 萬英文字減到 6,000

So I thought this was quite worthwhile.

我覺得幾好啊

然後我就開始嗌我所有嘅朋友

So I started asking all my friends,

please take your favorite TED Talk and put that into six words.

用六個英文字總結佢哋最鐘意嘅演講

So here are some of the results that I received.

依啲就係其中一啲例子，我覺得都幾好

譬如話 Dan Pink 關於動機嘅演講︰ 「唔要紅蘿蔔，唔要棍，淨係要意義。」

I think they're quite nice.

For example, Dan Pink's talk on motivation, which was pretty good,

佢講得幾好，未睇過嘅快啲去睇下

if you haven't seen it: "Drop carrot. Drop stick. Bring meaning."

依三句基本上就係佢十八分半鐘講嘅嘢

It's what he's basically talking about in those 18,5 minutes.

仲有人直接引用演講者嘅說話

Or some even included references to the speakers,

例如 Nathan Myhrvold 嘅風格演講

such as Nathan Myhrvold's speaking style, or the one of Tim Ferriss,

同埋 Tim Ferriss 嘅演講

Tim Ferriss 嘅演講有時比較激動

which might be considered a bit strenuous at times.

宜家嘅問題係 如果我想有系統咁總結啲演講

The challenge here is, if I try to systematically do this,

我應該會有好多概要

I would probably end up with a lot of summaries,

不過會有好多敵人

but not with many friends in the end.

所以我需要一個新方法

So I had to find a different method, preferably involving total strangers.

最好係只需要陌生人嘅

好好彩，有一個叫做 Mechanical Turk 嘅網站

And luckily, there's a website for that, called Mechanical Turk,

which is a website where you can post tasks

你可以喺上邊發佈你唔想自己做嘅嘢

that you don't want to do yourself,

譬如話「唔該幫我用三個英文字 總結依篇文章」

such as "Please summarize this text for me in six words."

我無通過任何低成本國家 嚟完成依個任務

And I didn't allow any low-cost countries to work on this,

but I found out I could get a six-word summary for just 10 cents,

不過我發現我淨係需要用 10 美分

我覺得好鬼平

which I think is a pretty good price.

但係就算係咁

Even then, unfortunately,

都無可能逐個濃縮曬所有演講

it's not possible to summarize each TED Talk individually.

Because if you do the math, you have a thousand TED Talks,

因為如果你計下，有一千個演講

一個演講 10 美分

you pay 10 cents each;

you have to do more than one summary for each of those talks,

一個演講需要至少寫兩個概要

because some of them will probably be, or are, really bad.

因為買返嚟嘅概要有可能質素好差

So I would end up paying hundreds of dollars.

結果就會變成我要畀幾百蚊美金

So I thought of a different way,

所以我又諗到個新方法

by thinking, well, the talks revolve around certain themes.

我就諗所有演講都係關於 幾個固定嘅話題

So what if I don't let people summarize individual TED Talks to six words,

如果我唔使人逐個總結

but give them 10 TED Talks at the same time

而係一次過畀佢哋 10 個演講

and say, "Please do a six-word summary for that one."

然後要佢哋用六個英文字 總結依 10 個演講

I would cut my costs by 90 percent.

我就可以將成本減少百分之九十

So for $60,

用 60 蚊美金

I could summarize a thousand TED Talks into just 600 summaries,

我就可以將一千個演講 濃縮成 600 個概要

which would actually be quite nice.

幾好啊！

Some of you might actually right now be thinking,

你哋可能會覺得

10 個演講變成 6 個英文字 根本無可能

it's downright crazy to have 10 TED Talks summarized into just six words.

But it's actually not,

事實係有可能嘅

because there's an example by statistics professor Hans Rosling.

統計學教授 Hans Rosling 嘅例子 可以證明

——我諗你哋都睇過佢嘅演講

I guess many of you have seen one or more of his talks.

佢喺網上有 8 個演講

He's got eight talks online,

全部基本上可以用一句話嚟總結

and those can basically be summed up into just four words,

because that's all he's basically showing us, our intuition is really bad.

所有演講都係想話我哋知︰

「我哋嘅直覺一啲都唔準。

佢次次都證明我哋係錯嘅。」

He always proves us wrong.

So people on the Internet, some didn't do so well.

講返網上請嘅人 佢哋做出嚟嘅嘢唔係太好

And when I asked them to summarize the 10 TED Talks at the same time,

當我嗌佢哋將 10 個演講 縮成 6 個英文字嘅時候

some took the easy route out.

有啲人就偷懶喇！

佢哋都畀啲好行嘅嘢

They just had some general comment.

There were others -- and I found this quite cheeky --

有哋仲好無恥用六個英文字駁返我

They used their six words to talk back to me

問我最近係咪沉迷於網絡搜尋

and ask me if I'd been too much on Google lately.

(Laughter)

And finally also, I never understood this,

我諗唔明點解有人會咁做

some people really came up with their own version of the truth.

有人甚至憑空作個總結出嚟

I don't know any TED Talk that contains this.

我唔知啲演講係咪真係有依啲內容

But, oh well.

不過

結果真係好令人驚奇

In the end, however, and this is really amazing,

for each of those 10 TED Talk clusters that I submitted,

所有我請求嘅演講批次

都得到好多有意義嘅概要

I actually received meaningful summaries.

Here are some of my favorites.

依啲係我比較鐘意嘅

例如所有關於食物嘅演講

For example, for the TED Talks about food,

有人總結成： 「食物塑造身體、大腦同環境」

someone summed this up into: "Food shaping body, brains and environment,"

我覺得唔錯

which I think is pretty good.

關於幸福感嘅：

Or happiness: "Striving toward happiness = moving toward unhappiness."

「努力得到幸福等如邁向不幸。」

So here I was.

到依度

I had started out with a thousand TED Talks

我係由一千個演講開始 濃縮到 600 組六個英文字概要

and I had 600 six-word summaries for those.

聽落幾好

Actually, it sounded nice in the beginning,

但係當你望住依 600 個概要

but when you look at 600 summaries, it's quite a lot, it's a huge list.

其實都幾多

(Laughter)

然後我就諗，或者可以再濃縮

So I thought, I probably have to take this one step further here

and create summaries of the summaries, and this is exactly what I did.

製造一個概要嘅概要

——我的確做咗依件事

So I took the 600 summaries that I had, put them into nine groups

我將依 600 個概要

根據網上評分分成 9 組

according to the ratings that the talks had originally received on TED.com

and asked people to do summaries of those.

然後搵人將佢哋濃縮

今次又有誤解喇！

Again, there were some misunderstandings.

有人以為我想喺依啲咁精彩嘅演講入邊

For example, when I had a cluster of all the "Beautiful" talks,

搵一句好易上口嘅口號

someone thought I was just trying to find the ultimate pick-up line.

不過令我驚訝嘅係

But in the end, amazingly,

再一次，我請嘅人都做到嘢

again, people were able to do it.

例如所有有關膽量嘅演講

For example, all the courageous TED Talks:

總結成「人亡」或者「人受難」 或者「總有簡單嘅解決方法」

"People dying" or "People suffering" was also one,

"with easy solutions around."

仲有個令人詫異嘅演講總結成：

Or the recipe for the ultimate jaw-dropping TED Talk:

「星際古典樂作曲家嘅相。」

"Flickr photos of intergalactic classical composer."

依嗰就係精粹所在

I mean that's the essence of it all.

Now I had my nine groups, but, I mean, it's already quite a reduction.

宜家我有 9 組非常概要

But of course, once you are that far, you're not really satisfied.

但係當你做得越耐，你就越唔滿足

就好似精餾釀酒一樣 你想得到最精餾嘅

I wanted to go all the way, all the way down the distillery,

所以我由一千個演講開始

starting out with a thousand TED Talks.

我想將一千個演講濃縮成六個英文字

I wanted to have a thousand TED Talks summarized into just six words --

which would be a 99.9997 percent reduction in content.

百分之 99.9997 嘅縮減率

不過我凈係畀咗 99.5 美金

And I would only pay $99.50 --

so stay even below $100 for it.

總經費少於一百美金

今次一共有 50 個概要

So I had 50 overall summaries done.

This time I paid 25 cents

25 美分一篇

因為我諗著今次難啲，所以費用會多啲

because I thought the task was a bit harder.

And unfortunately, when I first received the answers --

但不幸，我最初收到嘅結果

and here, you'll see six of the answers -- I was a bit disappointed.

其中六個令我有啲失望

Because I think you'll agree, they all summarize some aspect of TED,

你哋應該會同意 佢哋都總結咗 TED 嘅某啲方面

但係感覺佢哋有啲平淡

but to me, they felt a bit bland,

有或者佢哋都分別總結咗 TED 嘅一個方面

or they just had a certain aspect of TED in them.

So I was almost ready to give up

然後我差唔多要放棄喇！

when one night, I played around with these sentences

直到有一晚，我開始組合依啲字

and found out that there's actually a beautiful solution in here.

結果發現咗一個好好嘅方法

So here it is,

依個就係

a crowd-sourced, six-word summary of a thousand TED Talks

通過眾籌力量、價值 99.5 美金嘅

at the value of $99.50:

一千演講六個英文字概要：

"Why the worry? I'd rather wonder."

Why the worry? I'd rather wonder （譯︰憂乜鬼？噢就算）

多謝

Thank you very much.

(Applause)

（掌聲）