TEDxYALE - Yael Zinkow - The Perfect TED Talk

Yale University Senior and Comedian, Yael Zinkow performs a stand up routine on how to give the perfect TED talk.

I'm so sorry guys. I have to -- find another --

I was supposed to give this talk

on how to give the perfect TED Talk.

And then they put me last.

So everyone's already gone.

And I´ve no other ideas worth spreading --

(Laughter)

So, luckily Gant provided us with some books.

Let's see, "The Outside Leaf". No.

"The Century of Columbus". No.

Okey, you know what? Screw it!

I'm sure many of you, guys, will give TED Talks again in the future.

And you know, for the rest of you it turns out

you don't really have to have done anything to give a TED Talk.

'Cause they asked me. (Laughter)

So you never really know.

So I'm just gonna give some advice

on how to give the perfect TED Talk.

For those of you that went today,

you guys were OK.

(Laughter)

But, you guys -- there's things that you have to learn, so --

Alright, I've to get the evil clicker here.

(Laughter)

The first thing that you wanna do

is connect with your audience, right?

So there are a number of ways to do that.

One is ask a question

that will engage the audience,

a sort of mind game, so I could --

Oh, my TED Talk, my sample TED Talk,

is about TED Talks,
because I like to be meta. So --

(Laughter)

So my talk is about TED Talks and I wanna engage you.

So I might say something like,

I want you all to imagine

that you are sitting in a TED Talk.

(Laughter)

You feel that connection?

(Laughter)

Or you could give a personal anecdote.

That's another great way of connecting.

So I could say something like,

my grandfather's name was TED.

(Laughter)

Now we are connected.

(Applause)

Now you have to move into your actual talk.

You might think you need a transition here. You don't!

Distract your audience with a modern minimalist slide.

(Laughter)

And then ask a question that you're probably not gonna answer.

What is TED?

(Laughter)

You'll find when you give the talks that pauses

are often more powerful than the words themselves.

(Laughter)

Okay, great! (Laughter)

Now the next thing that you need to think about when giving your TED Talks

are the graphics that you wanna use.

This are very, very important.

There are a few different types of graphics

that you can use.

Abstract Computer Generated Images. (Laughter)

These are wonderful.

These will make the audience think that you are brilliant.

(Laughter)

Even though you may have looked up "awesome brain image" on Google images.

(Laughter)

The audience will actually believe that you had something to do with this.

While the image is up there you could talk about

anything from the sandwich you had for lunch to

your secret love of country music,

and the audience will believe that whatever you're saying is brilliant

because of the veins on the screen. (Laughter)

Another thing that you can do is use

a moderately funny cartoon that slightly relates to your topic.

This is to entertain the audience if you are not funny --

I should probably just move on.

This is the most important part of your TED Talk.

Impressive charts. (Laughter)

Now --

(Laughter)

(Applause)

Now I wanna make sure you guys know.

It doesn't matter what the chart says.

As long it's 3D and in many different colors, it works! OK?

Now, as you see this is a chart about

reasons people watch TED Talks.

While the chart's up there I'm just gonna throw out some buzz words

that you should probably use while the charts are up there.

Lab, research assistant, data.

(Laughter)

All great buzz words.

Better than a chart is ... another chart!

(Laughter)

Now it's good to use -- if you use a --

(Laughter)

If you use a pie graph it's good to use another

different type of graph.

As you can see this is a bar graph.

Again 3D, colorful, all good things.

Now, at this point in a TED Talk

you're probably gonna get tired of listening to the person,

unless you are beautiful.

So it's probably good to use a video.

So here we have a video of what a TED Talk might look like in the year 2050.

Consciousness. What is it?

We don't know.

I'm really looking forward to it.

The entire conference will be an hour long. It'll be great.

Now we've reached the end of the TED Talk.

And it doesn't matter if you've imparted any wisdom at all

on the audience

because you'll end with an abstract statement

and come down to the front of the stage and say,

"TED is... You"

(Laughter)

Thank you.

(Laughter) (Applause)