BIOGRAPHY
Ed Cooke is a Grand Master of Memory and co-founder and CEO of Memrise, the award-winning app that teaches cutting edge memory techniques to optimise learning.
Key to Ed’s approach is demonstrating that, far from being boring and monotonous, training your memory is all about unleashing your imagination and cultivating positive emotions – it is in fact an incredibly powerful tool for enhancing our motivation, fuelling our creativity and enriching our world.
Ed first got hooked on memory techniques aged 18 during a three month stint in hospital. With nothing to do but try and impress the nurses, he immersed himself in a book by World Memory Champion Dominic O’Brien, and soon was able to memorise 200 foreign words in an hour and a shuffled pack of cards in a matter of minutes.
After completing a degree in Philosophy and Psychology at Oxford, and a Masters in Cognitive Science at Paris Descartes University, Cooke went on to become a Grand Master of Memory aged just 23.
He subsequently met journalist Joshua Foer and coached him to become US Memory Champion in under a year. Foer featured Ed Cooke prominently in his book Moonwalking with Einstein (2011), which stayed on the New York Times bestseller list for 8 weeks.
Most recently, Ed’s focus has been co-founding and growing Memrise, an app that employs cutting-edge technology and an intimate knowledge of brain science to help people learn faster. Ed Cooke’s aim is to make the Memrise user experience so powerful that learning a language will be as easy and natural as ordering shopping online.
He must be doing something right – Memrise currently has over 25 million users and has won an array of Android and Apple awards. Most recently it won Best App at the 2017 Google Play Awards.
Contact VBQ founding agent Leo von Bülow-Quirk for more information about speaker Ed Cooke.
ED COOKE : SPEAKER
With great wit and natural charm, Ed’s engaging, interactive talks show us how to harness our creativity and imagination to achieve feats we didn’t think were possible.
His insights not only inspire and entertain. They also provide a practical set of tools for us to improve our motivation by bringing curiosity and playfulness into the forefront of our everyday lives. He can also perform astonishing memory feats live for the audience!
Ed Cooke speaks about methodologies that are utilised to establish mind boggling feats of memory that can change lives and promote success in learning. Ed visualises learning as a game and memory as an art form. He believes that flexing your memory is a skill that can be learned to release the imagination.
Through his pioneering work at Memrise, Ed Cooke also provides audiences with invaluable perspectives on how business is changing as we move firmly into the internet age. He covers themes such as:
- How to design brilliant user experiences
- Gamification
- Trends in the digital economy
- Fostering an entrepreneurial culture
Testimonials
“Feedback about your talk was overwhelmingly positive! It was the highest rated with 8.83/10!” — London tech conference
“Great speaker and content!” — Audience member
“Superbly insightful and fun” — Product development conference
“Very funny and engaging!” — Audience member
Media links
Five Minutes With Ed Cooke – 2017
Interview – CityA.M., July 2016
Founders Diaries – Real Business, November 2016