Mullen was invited by the Sapling Foundation, as part of its TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) public speaking series, to present at the University of Southern California (USC) in June 2012. Mullen's talk was entitled, "How context shapes content", and featured his perspectives on the manner in which the street-based context of skateboarding influences his practice, in addition to his view of the skateboarding community, whereby he compared the community to the open source and hacking movements. Mullen also spoke about resilience and creativity in a talk entitled "Getting Back Up" at the Pop!Tech "Sparks of Brilliance" event in October 2013.