Don Norman, one of the Godfathers of user experience and known well for ‘Norman Doors’, talks at TED in 2003 about beauty, fun, and emotional design. Don talks about the three ways that good design makes you happy, including the visceral, behavioral, and reflective aspects of design. For more, check out his now ubiquitous book The Design of Everyday Things.

Richard A. Muller, physics professor at Berkeley, talks about the importance of educating everyone about physics. While he reaches about 1000 students a year, over the past few years he has been reaching thousands more through his class’s online web cast and popular book. Muller stresses the importance for policy makers to have an understanding of physics and his course teaches principals in an entertaining way that everyone can relate to.

Natalie Kuldell and Reshma Shetty from MIT speak about current efforts to enable everyday hobbyists to experiment and build their own organisms. Whether it is making bacteria smell like bananas, or engineering trees to grow into houses, they would like to enable people to embark on such efforts by mimicking the homebrew computer clubs of the 1980s. Once inspired, check out DIYbio.org to get started and join the growing community.

Scott McCloud, author of several books including Understanding Comics, presents at TED a sketch of his life growing up and and a look into the future of comics. After a brief overview of understanding comics, the meat of the presentation lies in how the medium has moved from printed media and into fully interactive mediums such as those offered through the computer.

Jason Salfi, co-founder of Comet Skateboards, talks about how the company is using eco-friendly materials to create their fully biodegradable skateboards. The company has found a way to use soy-based resins, non-volatile paints, and a biocomposite wood substitute from e2e Materials to make the boards all in a location local to the raw materials.

Biologically inspired, Festo’s Airics Arm is modeled after a human arm and is capable of the same movement patterns. The arm is powered by 30 pneumatic muscles attached to an artificial skeletal system. Capable of lifting weights and writing, the bionic arm offers a glimpse into the future of prosthetic devices.

The Actuated Workbench uses a bed of electromagnets to control physical objects placed on top of it. First published in 2002 by Gian Pangaro, Dan Maynes-Aminzade, and Professor Hiroshi Ishii, development was continued. Dan (aka Monzy) has released a more recent video demonstrating the improvements made as well as some interesting new interaction possibilities.

Stephen Elop, President of the Microsoft Business Division, has been showing their vision for the future where nearly every surface will be an interactive display. With the looming battle between companies over patented gestures as mentioned in Dan Saffer’s talk, it is now an arms race to see which company will infiltrate homes and office with gestural and touch based systems. Regardless, it is great to see some of the concepts explored in the video.