Ryan North is the author of the long-running Dinosaur Comics (qwantz.com), the acclaimed Adventure Time comic series (kaboom-studios.com), and the recordbreaking To Be Or Not To Be: That Is The Adventure (hamletbook.com) a choose-your-own-path re-imagining of Hamlet. He also coedited the bestselling Machine of Death anthology (machineofdeath.net). He studied Computational Linguistics at U of T (utoronto.ca). He is 32 years old and lives in Toronto with his wife and dog, Noam Chompsky (chompsky.tumblr.com). In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)