The second annual TEDxUIllinois conference will be held Sept. 15, according to the group’s website.

TED is a nonprofit organization devoted to “ideas worth spreading.” Originally as a four-day conference in California 25 years ago, TED has grown to support world-changing ideas with multiple initiatives. The annual TED Conference invites the world’s leading thinkers to share their ideas for 18 minutes.

Similar to the world famous TED conferences, the independently-organized TEDxUIllinois will “demonstrate the wealth of knowledge, talent, and energy the University of Illinois and Champaign-Urbana are known for,” and challenges the speaker to give “the talk of your life” in 18 minutes or less.

The theme of this year’s event is “the Medium is the Message,” in honor of what would have been media scholar Marshall McLuhan’s 100th birthday this year, who coined the phrase.

“A range of accomplished and acclaimed speakers will explore topics such as the future of journalism, the worldwide race to create the perfect battery, building a ‘smarter’ Chicago, threats to the freedom of the Internet, and how a pair of traditional institutions — C-SPAN and Major League Baseball — have reinvented themselves online,” according to the website.

Speakers this year include Jeff Chamberlain and Don Hillebrand , Argonne National Laboratory battery and transportation researchers; Brant Houston, Knight Chair for Investigative and Enterprise Reporting for the College of Media at the University; Larry Ingrassia, business editor for The New York Times; Alan Joyce, content manager for socioeconomic data in Wolfram|Alpha; Rob Kennedy, president and Co-COO of C-SPAN; Will Leitch, author and contributing Writer for New York Magazine; Greg Lindsay, author and contributing writer for Fast Company; Dr. Lisa Nakamura, University professor of Media & Cinema Studies; Lee Rainie, founder and director of the Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project; Dr. Christian Sandvig, University professor of Communication, Media & Cinema Studies, Library & Information Science, and research associate professor at the Coordinated Science Laboratory; Joseph Squier, University professor of Art & English, College of Fine and Applied Arts and associate director of the School of Art & Design, and John Tolva, chief technical officer for the city of Chicago.

Registration will begin at 8:30 a.m., and events from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology in Urbana.

Attendees must register “here”:http://go.media.illinois.edu/TEDxUIllinois to attend the event, or visit TEDxUIllinois’ “website”:http://www.tedxuillinois.com/ for more information.