What was special about TED Global Conference 2007?

Thanks to tireless Ethan Zuckerman, Erik Hersman, Jennifer Rea and all the other bloggers who provided such fascinating coverage of the just-ended TED Global Conference 2007.  Jennifer made my day with her post - "Writing a new story about Africa," in which she invites the reader to "imagine four days where you only use the good words to talk about Africa: words of forward motion, words of change...[four days of hearing] from the mouths of people who are out there living it, building it, succeeding (and quite possibly getting very rich) in Africa."  I think it is safe to say that TED Global Conference 2007 was special in that it marked a turning point towards the 're-branding' of Africa.