political cartoonist.

I don't know if you've heard about it -- newspapers?

It's a sort of paper-based reader.

(Laughter)

It's lighter than an iPad,

it's a bit cheaper.

You know what they say?

They say the print media is dying --

who says that? Well, the media.

But this is no news, right?

You've read about it already.

(Laughter)

Ladies and gentlemen,

the world has gotten smaller.

I know it's a cliche, but look,

look how small,

how tiny it has gotten.

And you know the reason why, of course.

This is because of technology -- yeah.

(Laughter)

Any computer designers in the room?

Yeah well,

you guys are making my life miserable

because track pads used to be round,

a nice round shape.

That makes a good cartoon.

But what are you going to do with a flat track pad,

those square things?

There's nothing I can do as a cartoonist.

Well, I know the world is flat now.

That's true.

And the Internet has reached

every corner of the world,

the poorest, the remotest places.

Every village in Africa now has a cyber cafe.

(Laughter)

Don't go asking for a Frappuccino there.

So we are bridging the digital divide.

The Third World is connected,

we are connected.

And what happens next?

Well, you've got mail.

Yeah.

Well, the Internet has empowered us.

It has empowered you,

it has empowered me

and it has empowered some other guys as well.

(Laughter)

You know, these last two cartoons --

I did them live

during a conference in Hanoi.

And they were not used to that

in communist 2.0 Vietnam.

(Laughter)

So I was cartooning live on a wide screen --

it was quite a sensation --

and then this guy came to me.

He was taking pictures of me and of my sketches,

and I thought, "This is great, a Vietnamese fan."

And as he came the second day,

I thought, "Wow, that's really a cartoon lover."

And on the third day, I finally understood,

the guy was actually on duty.

So by now, there must be a hundred pictures of me

smiling with my sketches

in the files of the Vietnamese police.

(Laughter)

No, but it's true: the Internet has changed the world.

It has rocked the music industry;

it has changed the way we consume music.

For those of you old enough to remember,

we used to have to go to the store

to steal it.

(Laughter)

And it has changed the way

your future employer

will look at your application.

So be careful

with that Facebook account --

your momma told you, be careful.

And technology has set us free --

this is free WiFi.

But yeah, it has liberated us

from the office desk.

This is your life,

enjoy it.

(Laughter)

In short, technology, the internet,

they have changed our lifestyle.

Tech guru, like this man --

that a German magazine called the philosopher of the 21st century --

they are shaping the way we do things.

They are shaping the way we consume.

They are shaping our very desires.

(Laughter)

(Applause)

You will not like it.

And technology has even changed

our relationship to God.

(Laughter)

Now I shouldn't get into this.

Religion and political cartoons,

as you may have heard,

make a difficult couple,

ever since that day of 2005,

when a bunch of cartoonists in Denmark

drew cartoons that had repercussions all over the world --

demonstrations, fatwa,

they provoked violence. People died in the violence.

This was so sickening;

people died because of cartoons.

I mean --

I had the feeling at the time

that cartoons had been used by both sides, actually.

They were used first by a Danish newspaper,

which wanted to make a point on Islam.

A Danish cartoonist told me he was one of the 24

who received the assignment to draw the prophet --

12 of them refused. Did you know that?

He told me, "Nobody has to tell me what I should draw.

This is not how it works."

And then, of course, they were used

by extremists and politicians on the other side.

They wanted to stir up controversy.

You know the story.

We know that cartoons can be used as weapons.

History tells us,

they've been used by the Nazis

to attack the Jews.

And here we are now.

In the United Nations,

half of the world is pushing

to penalize the offense to religion --

they call it the defamation of religion --

while the other half of the world is fighting back

in defense of freedom of speech.

So the clash of civilizations is here,

and cartoons are at the middle of it?

This got me thinking.

Now you see me thinking

at my kitchen table,

and since you're in my kitchen,

please meet my wife.

(Laughter)

In 2006, a few months after,

I went Ivory Coast --

Western Africa.

Now, talk of a divided place -- the country was cut in two.

You had a rebellion in the North,

the government in the South -- the capital, Abidjan --

and in the middle, the French army.

This looks like a giant hamburger.

You don't want to be the ham in the middle.

I was there to report on that story

in cartoons.

I've been doing this for the last 15 years;

it's my side job, if you want.

So you see the style is different.

This is more serious than maybe editorial cartooning.

I went to places like Gaza

during the war in 2009.

So this is really journalism in cartoons.

You'll hear more and more about it.

This is the future of journalism, I think.

And of course, I went to see the rebels in the north.

Those were poor guys fighting for their rights.

There was an ethnic side to this conflict

as very often in Africa.

And I went to see the Dozo.

The Dozo, they are the traditional hunters

of West Africa.

People fear them --

they help the rebellion a lot.

They are believed to have magical powers.

They can disappear and escape bullets.

I went to see a Dozo chief;

he told me about his magical powers.

He said, "I can chop your head off right away

and bring you back to life."