Scott Brown is no stranger to mountain festivals. He helped start the Telluride Bluegrass and Film Festivals, so believe him when he says the Telluride Tech Festival is different from any other high-country celebration in existence. "It's about being smart," Brown says. "Telluride is isolated, in a sense," he adds. "In Denver and Boulder, you have a lot of music, a lot of this, a lot of that, but you also have colleges and universities, and if you want to seek out physics lectures, you can do it — whereas here we've had nothing. And it's just unacceptable to me to be the stupidest guy in the room."

So each year they bring in some high minds and have them get down and dirty with festival-goers. "We try to pick people who have changed the world through something they did," Brown says. "I think it's the personal, little things that make it different. You can go hear a physicist this week if you want to, but can you go to dinner with him?"

This year's honorees include science deities Eric Allman, David Sinclair, Robert Sproull, Bob Stein and Robert Winter. The extravaganza started on Friday, but there's still time to catch the final hours of the action today. All lectures are free and open to the public, but for $200 you can enjoy front-row seating as well as cocktails and a picnic lunch with the honorees. For registration and information, call 1-970-728-7000 or visit www.techfestival.org.
Aug. 11-13