When Amanda Palmer delivered a TED talk about the "art of asking", I knew the platform was more interested in money and publicity than any sense of intellectual rigor. Mostly because they allowed a person a platform from which to spew anecdotal garbage, and secondly, because the platform presents itself as immune to criticism. It is, to me, an embodiment of the phony image that Amanda Palmer has based her entire career upon (she's not the only one, simply the most obvious), and it's that selfish faux sincerity that strikes me as f#*king disgusting.

Some might question my basis for this, but I didn't earn my National Forensics League membership easily. TED is essentially feel-good, disposable information. Compared to Nova, or pretty much any issue of National Geographic, it's a pile of profitable hot garbage.