TEDxJacksonville is making major changes to its annual conference — changing venues for the first time, doubling the size of its audience and adding new engagement “Adventures.” “Fear Less” — the TEDxJacksonville 2016 conference — will bring talented speakers and musical guests to the stage on Saturday, October 22, at the historic Florida Theatre, built in 1927 and renovated in 1980. After three consecutive years of conference sellouts at WJCT Studios, TEDxJacksonville’s move to the Florida Theatre allows it to double its audience capacity to 700. “WJCT has been a wonderful home for our conference, and we’ve grown a lot there. Because of the demand and great word-of-mouth advertising at WJCT, we need to expand our capacity, and the Florida Theatre is the perfect venue for us this year,” said Sabeen Perwaiz, co-organizer and executive producer of TEDxJacksonville. Tickets to the all-day conference will be sold on a first-come, first-served basis later this year. For the first time, TEDxJacksonville will offer “TEDx Adventures” to attendees of the October conference. Working with local nonprofits, businesses and community organizations, TEDxJacksonville will offer exclusive access to these partners. TEDxJacksonville attendees will have the opportunity to sign up for Adventures on October 22. The global TED organization recently approved TEDxJacksonville to host its fifth conference — and the fourth since the group changed its name from TEDxRiversideAvondale to TEDxJacksonville. In 2015, TEDxJacksonville’s “Into the Machine” conference brought 12 speakers from Northeast Florida, across the United States and Tunisia to the WJCT Studio stage with four musical guest performances. The conference was the first TEDx group event to be broadcast live on the TEDxTalks YouTube channel, with 3 million subscribers at the time. TEDxJacksonville 2016 Conference Theme Is “Fear Less” It’s said that mankind’s oldest and strongest emotion is fear. But to live fully — to risk boldly and embrace new challenges — requires that we learn to face fear and be free of it. Fear of failure, fear of the unknown, fear of ourselves or the opinions of others — what might we accomplish if focused on what motivates us into action, not what prevents us? Reach beyond your bubble. Be audacious. Fail forward. Let urgency conquer apprehension. At this year’s TEDxJacksonville conference, we will reject fearful and be fearless.