WEBVTT

00:00:07.261 --> 00:00:08.339
Hi.

00:00:09.665 --> 00:00:11.279
I'm Maisie Williams.

00:00:11.279 --> 00:00:14.053
And I'm kind of just waiting
for someone to come on stage

00:00:14.053 --> 00:00:17.271
and tell me that there's been
some sort of miscommunication,

00:00:17.271 --> 00:00:19.352
and that I should probably leave.

00:00:20.916 --> 00:00:22.088
No?

00:00:23.330 --> 00:00:24.472
Damn it.

00:00:24.472 --> 00:00:26.035
(Laughter)

00:00:26.675 --> 00:00:29.806
So, some of you may know me as an actress.

00:00:30.188 --> 00:00:32.726
(Cheers) (Laughter)

00:00:32.806 --> 00:00:36.742
Some of you may know me
for my really average tweets.

00:00:36.742 --> 00:00:38.231
(Cheers)

00:00:38.231 --> 00:00:40.005
Oh, yeah.

00:00:40.241 --> 00:00:44.600
And some of you may be finding out
who I am for the first time right now.

00:00:44.600 --> 00:00:45.982
Hello.

00:00:46.693 --> 00:00:48.921
Whether you knew me before or not,

00:00:48.921 --> 00:00:52.247
you're probably wondering
what I'm going to talk to you about today.

00:00:52.384 --> 00:00:55.037
And I would be lying if I said

00:00:55.037 --> 00:00:57.586
it didn't take me
one or two sleepless nights,

00:00:57.586 --> 00:00:59.464
trying to figure that out, too.

00:00:59.464 --> 00:01:01.136
At last, here I am.

00:01:01.887 --> 00:01:05.708
Upon finding out the news
that I would be giving a TEDx Talk,

00:01:05.708 --> 00:01:07.594
I did what I think most people do

00:01:07.594 --> 00:01:10.582
and watched about
50 TED talks back-to-back,

00:01:10.582 --> 00:01:15.087
and read "Talk like TED"
by Carmine Gallo for some inspiration.

00:01:15.673 --> 00:01:17.205
Was I inspired?

00:01:18.349 --> 00:01:19.782
Yes and no.

00:01:20.369 --> 00:01:23.374
Did it make me want to go out
and change the world?

00:01:23.374 --> 00:01:24.830
Hell yeah.

00:01:24.941 --> 00:01:28.256
Did it make me feel like a totally
inadequate public speaker

00:01:28.256 --> 00:01:30.061
with absolutely no point to make,

00:01:30.061 --> 00:01:34.027
who was definitely in need of a big
thesaurus if she wants to keep up?

00:01:34.320 --> 00:01:35.511
Indeed.

00:01:36.404 --> 00:01:40.165
What could I possibly say
that would have any impact?

00:01:40.617 --> 00:01:42.822
What point am I trying to make?

00:01:42.822 --> 00:01:46.542
And who the hell thought
it was a good idea to give me a TEDx talk?

00:01:49.212 --> 00:01:51.460
So here's the part
where I tell you what I know:

00:01:52.828 --> 00:01:55.142
I'm the youngest of four siblings.

00:01:55.594 --> 00:01:58.315
My parents divorced
when I was four months old.

00:01:58.635 --> 00:02:01.802
I really was the icing on the cake
of a terrible marriage.

00:02:01.802 --> 00:02:03.434
(Laughter)

00:02:03.734 --> 00:02:07.049
I have two step siblings
who are younger than me

00:02:07.049 --> 00:02:10.201
and a half brother
who's older than all of us.

00:02:10.513 --> 00:02:13.932
I grew up in a three-bedroom council house

00:02:13.932 --> 00:02:17.144
with four of my six siblings
just outside of Bristol.

00:02:17.920 --> 00:02:20.684
I went to a very ordinary school.

00:02:20.684 --> 00:02:23.042
I got very ordinary grades.

00:02:23.435 --> 00:02:26.268
I wasn't quite good enough
to get a gold star,

00:02:26.268 --> 00:02:29.584
and I also wasn't quite bad enough
to be kept after school.

00:02:30.032 --> 00:02:34.476
I walked that nice center line
where if I kept my mouth shut in class,

00:02:34.661 --> 00:02:36.092
then I could probably get away

00:02:36.092 --> 00:02:39.643
with not being spoken to you
by teachers for weeks on end.

00:02:40.333 --> 00:02:42.744
Everything about me
was pretty damn ordinary,

00:02:43.353 --> 00:02:46.314
except for how I felt on the inside.

00:02:47.269 --> 00:02:50.063
I had big dreams.

00:02:50.892 --> 00:02:52.103
Shock.

00:02:53.901 --> 00:02:55.662
From as young as I can remember,

00:02:55.662 --> 00:02:59.022
I have dreamed of becoming
a professional dancer.

00:03:00.184 --> 00:03:02.501
There are certain memories
from my childhood

00:03:02.501 --> 00:03:04.811
that I would really rather forget.

00:03:05.373 --> 00:03:07.744
But during those times of immense pain,

00:03:08.044 --> 00:03:12.252
I found myself instinctively walking over
to my mother's CD player,

00:03:12.252 --> 00:03:15.413
cranking up the volume
to drown out the noise

00:03:15.413 --> 00:03:18.063
and letting my body move to the beat.

00:03:19.194 --> 00:03:21.634
It's hard to describe how it felt.

00:03:22.095 --> 00:03:26.161
I was harnessing emotions that I didn't
even really know the names of yet.

00:03:26.733 --> 00:03:28.724
I was summoning all of this energy

00:03:28.724 --> 00:03:33.012
and feeling it flow through my body
and out of my fingertips.

00:03:33.436 --> 00:03:38.093
I was alone in my own head,
and I felt the most alive.

00:03:39.247 --> 00:03:42.553
I didn't really know much
about the big wide world then,

00:03:42.553 --> 00:03:45.193
but I knew that this feeling
was addictive;

00:03:45.193 --> 00:03:48.748
and I was going to stop at nothing
until I made it my profession.

00:03:50.616 --> 00:03:54.853
At eight years old,
I was enrolled in dance class.

00:03:54.853 --> 00:03:57.803
And by ten, I informed my mother

00:03:57.803 --> 00:04:00.813
that I didn't want
to go to school anymore.

00:04:01.313 --> 00:04:04.890
I wanted to be like Billy Elliot
and go to stage school.

00:04:05.874 --> 00:04:10.832
This was the first opportunity
or challenge I was presented with.

00:04:11.764 --> 00:04:13.501
Even as young as ten,

00:04:13.501 --> 00:04:19.172
I was willing to give up all of my friends
and go away to board at a private school,

00:04:19.512 --> 00:04:22.333
away from my siblings, away from my mom.

00:04:23.231 --> 00:04:26.841
She would repeatedly ask me,
"Are you sure this is what you want?"

00:04:26.841 --> 00:04:30.297
And to me, it was a no-brainer.

00:04:30.491 --> 00:04:33.686
I didn't just want this; I needed it.

00:04:35.294 --> 00:04:40.555
My grubby knees and crooked teeth
were not on the list of requirements

00:04:40.555 --> 00:04:42.842
for becoming a professional dancer.

00:04:43.066 --> 00:04:45.292
And when I look back now,

00:04:45.292 --> 00:04:48.665
both myself and my mother
looked severely out of place.

00:04:49.762 --> 00:04:54.625
But at the time, I was just too young
and naive to feel inadequate.

00:04:55.033 --> 00:04:56.411
I didn't care.

00:04:56.512 --> 00:04:59.297
If Billy Elliot could do it, so could I.

00:04:59.881 --> 00:05:04.672
Once my audition was done, I returned home
for two weeks of staring out the window,

00:05:05.021 --> 00:05:06.995
waiting for the postman,

00:05:06.995 --> 00:05:09.614
waiting for my ticket
out of my sleepy village

00:05:09.614 --> 00:05:13.078
and into a world of jazz hands
and dorm rooms.

00:05:14.514 --> 00:05:19.095
It was good news followed by bad news:

00:05:19.531 --> 00:05:24.692
I had got in, but the fees to attend
a school like this were not cheap,

00:05:24.692 --> 00:05:29.498
and despite my best efforts,
I had not received any government funding.

00:05:30.362 --> 00:05:32.766
I auditioned again the following year.

00:05:32.766 --> 00:05:35.812
And this time, I received 40% funding,

00:05:35.812 --> 00:05:38.352
but this was still just money
that we didn't have,

00:05:38.352 --> 00:05:40.596
and it broke my heart.

00:05:41.412 --> 00:05:43.094
I was good enough.

00:05:43.816 --> 00:05:45.573
I made the cut.

00:05:46.572 --> 00:05:48.883
But I wasn't going anywhere.

00:05:51.142 --> 00:05:53.053
It was a blessing in disguise,

00:05:53.053 --> 00:05:55.503
although if anyone had said that
to me back then,

00:05:55.503 --> 00:05:58.823
I probably would've given them the finger
and told them to jog on.

00:05:59.552 --> 00:06:01.912
I wasn't willing to give up that easily.

00:06:02.192 --> 00:06:06.953
So at age 11, I was bursting
with excitement

00:06:06.968 --> 00:06:10.800
when my dance teacher
informed me of a talent show

00:06:10.800 --> 00:06:14.430
which boasted opportunities
of making you a star.

00:06:15.924 --> 00:06:20.375
This was the second opportunity
I was faced with.

00:06:20.538 --> 00:06:24.895
I entered into singing, acting,

00:06:25.189 --> 00:06:27.629
dancing and modeling.

00:06:28.680 --> 00:06:32.835
The talent show consisted
of workshops and seminars

00:06:32.835 --> 00:06:35.881
with specialists who would help
train you up for your performance

00:06:35.881 --> 00:06:37.644
at the end of the week.

00:06:37.790 --> 00:06:40.044
After meeting a woman
called Louise Johnston

00:06:40.044 --> 00:06:42.891
in an improvisation acting workshop,

00:06:42.891 --> 00:06:45.110
she gave me the words "bowling ball,"

00:06:45.110 --> 00:06:49.038
and asked me to create a short scene
inspired by these words.

00:06:49.199 --> 00:06:51.881
After making her laugh
with a fictional story,

00:06:51.881 --> 00:06:55.568
of how I threw a bowling ball
at my brother and it bounced,

00:06:55.568 --> 00:06:58.600
she asked me to join her acting agency.

00:06:59.351 --> 00:07:01.265
I didn't really know what this meant.

00:07:01.701 --> 00:07:07.213
I knew that I would do auditions
for films and maybe become an actor,

00:07:07.512 --> 00:07:11.244
but I still had big dreams
of becoming a professional dancer,

00:07:11.244 --> 00:07:14.294
so this woman was going
to have to work a lot harder than that

00:07:14.294 --> 00:07:16.842
if she was going to convince
eleven-year-old me

00:07:16.842 --> 00:07:19.086
that I was going to become an actress.

00:07:21.544 --> 00:07:23.246
Was this going to take time away

00:07:23.246 --> 00:07:26.469
from the 30 hours of dancing
I was doing a week?

00:07:27.052 --> 00:07:29.052
And what if I didn't get the part?

00:07:29.052 --> 00:07:30.948
Was this going to be too upsetting?

00:07:31.093 --> 00:07:33.613
And do actresses have teeth like mine?

00:07:33.613 --> 00:07:36.810
Because if they do,
I'm yet to watch any of their movies.

00:07:37.811 --> 00:07:41.133
After meeting Louise
in the February of 2009

00:07:41.547 --> 00:07:44.223
and trying but failing to land the part

00:07:44.223 --> 00:07:48.282
in the hit sequel "Nanny McPhee"
to "The Big Bang,"

00:07:49.050 --> 00:07:52.717
my second audition was for a show
called "Game of Thrones."

00:07:54.596 --> 00:07:59.342
This was the third opportunity
or challenge I was presented with.

00:08:00.328 --> 00:08:03.206
I climbed the steps
to the Methodist Church

00:08:03.206 --> 00:08:05.225
with my mother's hand in mine.

00:08:05.792 --> 00:08:09.882
I perched my tiny bottom in one
of the seats outside the audition room

00:08:09.882 --> 00:08:13.400
and listened to an annoying girl
with her even more annoying mother

00:08:13.400 --> 00:08:16.906
tell me all about the number of auditions
she had done prior to this one.

00:08:16.906 --> 00:08:18.841
And also about her pet fish.

00:08:20.883 --> 00:08:23.458
My name was called, then I stepped inside.

00:08:24.241 --> 00:08:26.638
I had a hard Bristolian accent

00:08:26.638 --> 00:08:31.351
and dark rings around my eyes that were
so big they took up half my face

00:08:31.351 --> 00:08:35.152
and a hole in the knee of my trousers
which I tried to cover with my left hand

00:08:35.152 --> 00:08:38.732
as I was talking to the kind lady
who taped my audition.

00:08:39.529 --> 00:08:41.554
But as soon as she pressed record,

00:08:42.310 --> 00:08:44.120
it all drifted away.

00:08:45.190 --> 00:08:48.481
Much like when I was dancing
in my mother's living room,

00:08:48.481 --> 00:08:51.813
I harnessed all of
my insecurities and self-doubt

00:08:51.813 --> 00:08:55.256
and let it flow through the words
that came out of my mouth.

00:08:56.110 --> 00:08:57.646
I was cheeky.

00:08:58.150 --> 00:08:59.723
I was loud.

00:09:00.064 --> 00:09:01.726
I was angry.

00:09:02.489 --> 00:09:05.765
And for this, I was perfect.

00:09:07.821 --> 00:09:11.502
After getting the part
and shooting the pilot episode,

00:09:11.502 --> 00:09:12.980
the show slowly grew

00:09:12.980 --> 00:09:16.055
to become one of the biggest shows
in television history.

00:09:17.206 --> 00:09:21.593
To this day, we've smashed
previous HBO viewing records.

00:09:22.063 --> 00:09:24.841
We've been nominated for over 130 Emmys,

00:09:24.841 --> 00:09:28.473
making us the most Emmy-nominated
show to ever exist.

00:09:29.679 --> 00:09:33.210
We've recently finished shooting
our eighth and final season,

00:09:33.210 --> 00:09:36.489
which is predicted to smash records
that we've already broken.

00:09:36.901 --> 00:09:42.913
And nearly a decade to the day
since my first audition,

00:09:44.013 --> 00:09:45.836
I'm still wondering,

00:09:46.884 --> 00:09:49.334
when am I going to get to be Billy Elliot?

00:09:49.727 --> 00:09:51.255
(Laughter)

00:09:51.705 --> 00:09:56.823
I joke, but in all seriousness, I have
absolutely no plans of slowing down.

00:09:57.046 --> 00:10:00.897
Throughout my time in this industry,
it has been a minefield.

00:10:00.897 --> 00:10:03.995
I have grown from a child into an adult,

00:10:03.995 --> 00:10:07.678
and from four feet tall
into a whopping five feet tall.

00:10:07.864 --> 00:10:09.515
(Laughter)

00:10:10.225 --> 00:10:13.535
I have constantly been trying
to say the right thing,

00:10:13.535 --> 00:10:15.837
accidentally saying the wrong thing,

00:10:15.837 --> 00:10:17.906
trying not to swear too much

00:10:17.906 --> 00:10:21.316
and trying to stop saying
"like, like" all of the time.

00:10:23.146 --> 00:10:25.566
In February of 2017,

00:10:25.566 --> 00:10:28.630
a friend of mine, Dom, and I
were swigging beers in my kitchen,

00:10:28.630 --> 00:10:29.727
and he confessed to me

00:10:29.727 --> 00:10:33.266
that there is a huge problem
with the creative industries.

00:10:33.421 --> 00:10:34.694
I agreed.

00:10:34.694 --> 00:10:37.093
The series of events
that had got me to that point

00:10:37.093 --> 00:10:41.089
were based mainly on luck and timing
and were unable to be recreated.

00:10:41.365 --> 00:10:44.337
He suggested to me
that we create a social media,

00:10:44.337 --> 00:10:48.076
but just for artists to be able
to collaborate with one another

00:10:48.076 --> 00:10:49.730
and create a career.

00:10:49.866 --> 00:10:53.847
This was the fourth opportunity
or challenge I was presented with.

00:10:54.636 --> 00:10:56.526
"Great," I thought.

00:10:57.389 --> 00:10:59.381
"How the hell do we do that?"

00:10:59.889 --> 00:11:01.591
And daisie was born.

00:11:02.088 --> 00:11:06.944
Of course, everyone who I spoke to about
my latest endeavor thought that I was mad;

00:11:07.072 --> 00:11:10.560
however, I know that this is something
that I can help change.

00:11:11.673 --> 00:11:15.977
This last year in the industry, we've seen
a huge shift with the Me Too movement.

00:11:16.319 --> 00:11:19.917
The industry is built with gatekeepers
holding all of the power

00:11:19.917 --> 00:11:23.886
and selecting who they deem talented
enough to advance to the next level.

00:11:24.095 --> 00:11:27.697
More often than not, it's easier
to catch the attention of those people

00:11:27.697 --> 00:11:30.588
if you have graduated
from an expensive school.

00:11:30.588 --> 00:11:34.417
But even then, I have so many friends
who are fresh out of art school,

00:11:34.417 --> 00:11:38.816
having trained for years and are still
no closer to creating a career.

00:11:39.552 --> 00:11:42.947
Now, I'm not claiming that with daisie
I can make everybody a star,

00:11:42.947 --> 00:11:44.185
but I do believe

00:11:44.185 --> 00:11:48.325
that the key to success within creative
industries is collaborating.

00:11:48.458 --> 00:11:51.425
Actors are only as good as their writers.

00:11:51.557 --> 00:11:54.676
Musicians are only as strong
as their producers.

00:11:54.826 --> 00:11:58.176
And designers need their teams.

00:11:58.946 --> 00:12:01.597
To start the company, we self-funded.

00:12:02.861 --> 00:12:04.928
I had a pot of cash from "Game of Thrones"

00:12:04.928 --> 00:12:07.251
that I was free to invest
wherever I liked.

00:12:07.576 --> 00:12:10.574
Dom had a series of businesses
from the age of 16,

00:12:10.574 --> 00:12:13.397
which meant he was also left
with a pot of cash.

00:12:13.397 --> 00:12:17.227
We threw our money together 50-50,
and we built a team.

00:12:17.747 --> 00:12:21.617
Now, Lady Gaga has repeatedly said

00:12:21.617 --> 00:12:27.267
that there could be a room of 100 people,
and 99 don't believe in you,

00:12:27.267 --> 00:12:30.375
but it just takes that one person
to believe in you,

00:12:30.375 --> 00:12:32.616
and they can change your life.

00:12:32.820 --> 00:12:36.045
Well, now we have a team of six.

00:12:37.495 --> 00:12:40.567
Over the next 16 months, we built our MVP.

00:12:40.567 --> 00:12:42.853
Now, if you're wondering what an MVP is,

00:12:42.853 --> 00:12:45.528
I only found out what it is
about six months ago.

00:12:45.528 --> 00:12:50.571
And from what I can gather, it's a product
which proves as a problem worth solving

00:12:50.571 --> 00:12:52.874
with the minimum team effort.

00:12:53.237 --> 00:12:56.510
So basically from my point of view,
you're marketing something

00:12:56.510 --> 00:12:59.126
which you know
is going to be good one day,

00:12:59.126 --> 00:13:01.507
but is a little bit bad right now.

00:13:01.936 --> 00:13:04.476
And for us, that was an iOS app.

00:13:04.787 --> 00:13:07.857
The six of us made an office
in Dom's garden,

00:13:07.857 --> 00:13:12.358
and on August 1, 2018,
we released our version one.

00:13:12.786 --> 00:13:17.158
We had over 30,000 downloads
in the first 24 hours

00:13:17.158 --> 00:13:19.357
and over 30,000 comments

00:13:19.357 --> 00:13:22.550
asking when the Android version
was going to be coming.

00:13:23.297 --> 00:13:28.721
Despite our app being imperfect, buggy
and literally built by one man alone,

00:13:28.721 --> 00:13:31.815
this was exactly what we needed
for people to invest.

00:13:31.815 --> 00:13:36.196
We learned a lot from our angry users
and our scary investors.

00:13:36.406 --> 00:13:41.019
And over the last six months,
we have grown our team to 16 people.

00:13:42.723 --> 00:13:45.156
From then till now,
we've been building version two,

00:13:45.156 --> 00:13:47.253
which we will be launching in April.

00:13:47.768 --> 00:13:48.904
Within the industry,

00:13:48.904 --> 00:13:52.188
there is a common phrase which I think
we're all pretty familiar with.

00:13:52.188 --> 00:13:55.588
And that is, "It's not what you know,
it's who you know."

00:13:55.588 --> 00:13:59.415
And with daisie, I hope to give
that power back to the creator.

00:13:59.598 --> 00:14:02.509
I want to encourage people
to create a list of contacts

00:14:02.509 --> 00:14:05.975
that they will work with and support
as they take their first steps

00:14:05.975 --> 00:14:09.427
into the fickle and often
challenging creative world.

00:14:10.143 --> 00:14:13.340
I am of the generation
who grew up with the Internet.

00:14:13.340 --> 00:14:15.401
I've never known anything else.

00:14:15.908 --> 00:14:20.796
We are connected, we are aware,
and we are the future.

00:14:21.757 --> 00:14:23.836
I hope daisie can breathe new life

00:14:23.836 --> 00:14:26.838
into the slightly dystopian,
ad-riddled hellscapes

00:14:26.838 --> 00:14:29.414
that social media platforms have become.

00:14:29.767 --> 00:14:33.567
I hope to create a space where people
can boast their art and creativity

00:14:33.567 --> 00:14:35.467
rather than what car they are driving

00:14:35.467 --> 00:14:38.349
and whether or not they bought it
in cash or on finance.

00:14:38.625 --> 00:14:42.558
In a world where literally
anyone can be famous,

00:14:42.558 --> 00:14:45.960
I hope to inspire people
to be talented instead.

00:14:46.897 --> 00:14:51.116
Talent will carry you so much further
than your 15 minutes of fame.

00:14:52.579 --> 00:14:54.638
So why am I telling you all this?

00:14:56.817 --> 00:14:59.657
The very fact that I'm here
giving a TEDx talk right now

00:14:59.657 --> 00:15:02.877
is so far from anything
I thought that I was capable of.

00:15:03.606 --> 00:15:06.696
Even writing the bio
for my speech made me realize

00:15:06.696 --> 00:15:10.536
that in a decade,
everything in my life has changed.

00:15:11.235 --> 00:15:16.615
I am an Emmy-nominated actress,
an entrepreneur and an activist;

00:15:16.960 --> 00:15:20.139
yet I have no formal
qualifications to my name.

00:15:22.565 --> 00:15:27.074
When I left school about seven years ago,
I made it my mission to continue learning

00:15:27.074 --> 00:15:30.164
even though I never wanted
to set foot in a classroom again.

00:15:30.753 --> 00:15:34.107
Who knows what's going to happen
to my life in the next 10 years?

00:15:34.107 --> 00:15:36.081
I surely have no idea.

00:15:36.587 --> 00:15:38.755
I've never had an end goal.

00:15:38.755 --> 00:15:40.908
It's working out okay so far.

00:15:41.907 --> 00:15:44.268
So trust that you're good enough.

00:15:45.506 --> 00:15:50.098
If there's one thing that I've learned is
that there truly is a place for everyone.

00:15:51.089 --> 00:15:52.757
Ask questions,

00:15:52.757 --> 00:15:56.351
and laugh in the face of people
who say that they're stupid questions.

00:15:57.418 --> 00:15:59.947
Be open to learning and admitting

00:15:59.947 --> 00:16:02.254
when you don't know
what the hell is going on.

00:16:03.088 --> 00:16:05.587
Refuse to hold yourself back,

00:16:06.080 --> 00:16:08.084
and dare to dream big.

00:16:08.821 --> 00:16:10.377
Thank you for listening.

00:16:10.377 --> 00:16:12.867
(Applause)