Juliette Powell: Digital Media has changed the face of Humanitarian Aid

(This post was translated from French. The original interview was published in Voir on Jan 28, 2010 and written by journalist Elias Levy.)

Author of 33 Million People in the Room, a bestseller on the power of social networking, former TV interviewer/producer at MuchMusic & MusiquePlus, and recognized expert in interactive new media, the dual citizen (US, Canada) Juliette Powell is firmly convinced that social media is radically transforming the concept of “human solidarity”.

Social media is playing a very important role in humanitarian assistance to the stricken people of Haiti.

Juliette Powell: “Absolutely. We often under-estimate the impact of social media, yet we are now seeing their efficiency in managing the humanitarian catastrophe in Haiti. The NGOs in this devastated country have been empowered by digital media to help source and provide humanitarian aid and medical care to the Haitian people. The use of social media helps relief workers accomplish their difficult task faster: Oxfam benefits from using YouTube; Unicef from Twitter; the UNDP (United Nations Development) from Flickr; the International Red Cross from Apple who has made its iTunes service freely available.

Since telephone infrastructure has been destroyed by the earthquake, the only means of communication in Haiti is through the Internet. Social media can spread information clouds very rapidly which can help rescue survivors in care areas using photos of disaster areas taken from satellites to survey population flow.

The whole online community has galvanized to be at the service of Haiti’s millions: Google has made available its satellite images to help the victims of the earthquake while Missing Persons are listed and discussed on Facebook, Twitter, MySpace. These realities reminds us that now, humanitarian aid can not live without the digital and social networks that feed it. ”

Are many donations to Haiti are raised through social media?

“Yes. Last week’s figures speak for themselves: 21 million of 150 million dollars raised so far for Haiti have been collected through donations made through social media. Since this unspeakable tragedy has befallen the people of Haiti, a movement of unprecedented solidarity very tangibly expressed through social media, has emerged to demonstrate that in emergency situations digital and social media is faster and more effective than traditional media.”

How does social media also play a role in the democratization policy of certain countries?

“It is undeniable that social media also plays a major role today in the struggle for democracy waged by people under the yoke of dictatorship. For example, through the use of social media, Iranian youth - many opponents of the radical regime of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - came to remind the world that they are wish for democracy and that they strongly reject the traditional insular vision of Iran defended by the current Iranian president and his supporters. Pictures and  videos of the strikingly brutal repression by the Iranian police of political activists and citizen journalists opposing Ahmadinejad was transmitted via the Web by dissidents and shared worldwide via social media.”

Why are you visiting Montreal, the hometown where you grew up?

“The Studio XX and the National Film Board (NFB) have launched a special training project called, ‘First Person Digital‘ a program for women to explore new narrative avenues. This project aims to inspire future filmmakers. First Person Digital distinguishes itself by offering a cross-disciplinarian production methodology cross-pollinating aspiring filmmakers, designers and the digerati.”

33 Million People in the Room: How to Create, Influence and Run a Successful Business with Social Networking by Juliette Powell (Published by Financial Times Press, 2009, 200 pages)

‘Some of it is timing’, says my friend Steve Crandall, a twenty-year veteran of Bell Labs and a particle physicist who works with everyone from Pixar to DARPA.  “I came from a place that had several billion dollar ideas, but few were realized inside the organization.  Of course turning an idea into money has several other important ideas along the way and some of the most important may only be remotely connected to the original”.

Asking the Twitter and Facebook communities for their thoughts resulted in some great responses. What’s the difference between a Million Dollar Idea and a Billion Dollar Idea? Here are the TOP 3 answers:

SCALABILITY: “If the design fails when the quantity increases then it does not scale.” says Miami-based artist and entrepreneur Andreas W. Gerdes.

EXECUTION: Is the idea executable and are you the right person to successfully execute the idea? “The world does not pay for good ideas. The world pays for the successful execution of a good idea”, insists tech freelancer, Joe Mohen.

TRANSFORMATION: Is the idea a ‘game-changer’ eg. “Does the idea change people’s behavior?”, asks Jason Segal, of Sustainable Development Capital when he is looking for an investment opportunity.

Music Icon Dave Stewart and Nokia are betting they’ve invested in a Billion-dollar, game-changing idea that will turn the music industry on it’s head and reaffirm Nokia’s leadership in the mobile space, despite today’s announcement of a $832 million dollar loss in the third quarter. Here’s an overview of the new business model via an interview with Stewart and his protegee Cindy Gomez:

Juliette Powell is an author, entrepreneur and integrated media specialist. Her first book: 33 Million People in the Room (Financial Times Press, 2009) builds on her work as co-founder and COO of the Gathering Think Tank Inc., an innovation forum at the intersection of integrated media, business, innovation and technology. A popular key note speaker and commentator, connect with Juliette directly at juliettepowell.com and Facebook.

Drop everything and make sure you’re in Times Square tonight at 8pm ET. Such was the message that boomed into my ear, just moments ago and frankly, I’m still reeling. After all, how often does one get a four minute phone call from space, no less?? The caller was Cirque du Soleil Founder, Guy Laliberte, who wanted to make sure that I  - and five thousand of my closest NY friends - are on-site tonight when Shakira does a surprise free performance as Cirque du Soleil takes over all of the screens in Times Square to broadcast the LIVE Moving Earth and Stars for Water Worldcast event.

Could one live global web-cast change the way we think about water issues? Cirque du Soleil and  celebrities like Shakira, U2, Al Gore, Selma Hayek and a constellation of other news makers and Nobel Prize laureates in 14 cities around the world are banking on making a difference via the live webcast on onedrop.org. More than just a celebrity-driven multi-million dollar world event, tonight’s amazing performance is part of Laliberte’s ‘Poetic Mission in Space’ that I wrote about in HuffingtonPost last June.

Under the theme Moving Stars and Earth for Water, the Poetic Social Mission will raise awareness about the issues of water in the world today from a variety of perspectives, including those of citizen journalists, bloggers and the twitter community.

What they all have in common is a concern regarding access to water and a desire to illustrate this in their own distinctive way.

Tonight’s Live Webcast:

Be Part of History - join me and all our Twitter friends in Times Square for the Live show. Share the word via twitter and don’t miss the live broadcast event on www.onedrop.org October 9, 2009 at 8:00 pm. EDT.

Juliette Powell is an author, entrepreneur and integrated media specialist. Her first book: 33 Million People in the Room (Financial Times Press, 2009) builds on her work as co-founder and COO of the Gathering Think Tank Inc., an innovation forum at the intersection of integrated media, business, innovation and technology. A popular key note speaker and commentator, connect with Juliette directly at juliettepowell.com and Facebook.

It all started when I came across a random link, originally posted on Twitter by the Official Twitter account of the World Economic Forum. The post led me to a new ‘Internet Manifesto‘ on ‘how journalism works today‘ and to a new story for Huffington Post where I posted the first five declarations for discussion.

Truth be told, as a journalist, I’m tired of seeing the usual suspects discuss what is best for all of us. I applaud @Davos and the World Economic Forum for bringing this Internet Manifesto to a wider audience. Now it’s up to all of us to define the type of future we’d like to co-create using the internet and so I give you the next 5 original declarations from the new Internet Manifesto, translated from German by Jenna L. Brinning and reproduced below for your review and comment. (The first five were posted here.)

The Internet changes improves journalism.

Through the Internet, journalism can fulfill its social-educational role in a new way. This includes presenting information as an ever-changing, continual process; the forfeiture of print media’s inalterability is a benefit. Those who want to survive in this new world of information need a new idealism, new journalistic ideas and a sense of pleasure in exploiting this new potential.

The net requires networking.

Links are connections. We know each other through links. Those who do not use them exclude themselves from social discourse. This also holds for the websites of traditional media companies.

Links reward, citations adorn.

Search engines and aggregators facilitate quality journalism: they boost the findability of outstanding content over a long-term basis and are thus an integral part of the new, networked public sphere. References through links and citations—especially including those made without any consent or even remuneration of the originator—make the very culture of networked social discourse possible in the first place. They are by all means worthy of protection.

The Internet is the new venue for political discourse.

Democracy thrives on participation and freedom of information. Transferring the political discussion from traditional media to the Internet and expanding on this discussion by involving the active participation of the public is one of journalism’s new tasks.

Today’s freedom of the press means freedom of opinion.

Article 5 of the German Constitution does not comprise protective rights for professions or technically traditional business models. The Internet overrides the technological boundaries between the amateur and professional. This is why the privilege of freedom of the press must hold for anyone who can contribute to the fulfillment of journalistic duties. Qualitatively speaking, no differentiation should be made between paid and unpaid journalism, but rather, between good and poor journalism.

Now some of you may read all 17 declarations from the Internet Manifesto just to find out why the German constitution is mentioned (the authors of the manifesto are German) or you might wait for my next post but more to the point, what is a manifesto anyway? According to Wikipedia:

“A manifesto is a public declaration of principles and intentions, often political in nature.”

Just above the wikipedia page, a note that puts the declarations below and the intention of this post into perspective: ‘The examples in this article may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. Please improve this article and discuss the issue‘. Yes, please..

Author, Juliette Powell

Juliette Powell is an author, entrepreneur and integrated media specialist. Her first book 33 Million People in the Room (Financial Times Press, 2009) builds on her work as co-founder and COO of the Gathering Think Tank Inc., an innovation forum at the intersection of integrated media, business, innovation and technology. A popular keynote speaker and commentator, connect with Juliette directly at juliettepowell.com, twitter and Facebook.

While my last post was about media literacy, this one is more focused on digital literacy and how it affects your career. Many of us are aware there exists a digital divide: some people have access to digital technology while others don’t, particularly in extremely poor rural areas and in developing countries. What we rarely hear about is the digital divide happening right here, in our homes, neighborhoods and in our companies.

Digital literacy is the difference between knowing how to consume digital media (like searching for information on the internet) and knowing how to communicate, produce and distribute a message using digital media (like starting a blog or producing and uploading a useful video to youtube). While the divide between those who are digitally literate and those who aren’t is generally thought of as a demographic issue, I tend to think of it as a psychographic barrier as well. In other words, the ability to use digital technology isn’t determined solely on where and when you were born, it is also determined by a person’s affinity to technology in general and to digital media in particular.

For those of you who want to tap into the current zeitgeist around the digital literacy required these days to build a career using social networking, here’s an interview with personal branding coach to the millennial generation, Dan Schawbel, who shares insights and tips from his new best-selling book: Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success. (Kaplan Publishing, April 2009).

While 33 million People in the Room details how entrepreneurs and companies can build social and cultural capital using social networking, Me 2.0 takes a different tact to communicate a similar message, what is the main hypothesis behind your book?

The main hypothesis behind Me 2.0 is that everyone needs to “command their career.”  Tom Peters, the inventor of personal branding, always stated that we have to be the chief marketer for the brand called us.  He was all about Me Inc. and how we had to think of ourselves as companies and use the same strategies to stand out.

Being the commander of your career means that you’re accountable for your successes and failures.  You have to take ownership and full responsibility for your career.

Although, you might seek advice from teachers and managers, you know who you are, what you’re capable of and have to make the decisions.  You need to be in the drivers seat and that’s the only way you’re going to succeed.  The four steps I’ve outlined in Me 2.0 (discover, create, communicate, maintain) are aligned to this main idea.

What are some of the new ideas and tips that emerge from your book that people can apply immediately?

• Reserve your name on the leading social networks, while purchasing your domain name and being an active contributor to your own blog.
• Get endorsements as much as you can from your managers, teachers, etc.
• Always think about how you can use what you’ve accomplished in the past to get your next opportunity in the future.
• Understand that the number of Twitter followers, Facebook friends and LinkedIn contacts is a marketing list that you can tap at anytime.  They are internet assets!
• Have a clear branding strategy before you engage online and offline.
• Focus on relationships instead of making money.  The personal equity will get you further than paper currency.

What companies/ individuals are best representing the strategy and tactics described in ‘Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success’?
When it comes to personal branding, Donald Trump, Oprah, and Madonna are three of the top ones that people have heard of.  Celebrity internet brands examples are Kevin Rose, Pete Cashmore, Rohit Bhargava and Jeremiah Owyang.   Companies that have strong brands through social media are Zappos, Comcast, EMC (I work there), and Ford.

*What specific tips do you have to effectively leverage each of the social tools: video on the net, blog, twitter, facebook, other?

• Blogs are more important than all the social networks combined because they are hubs of information  and are something you can control.
• Decide weather you’re better at doing video or writing.  Invest more of your energy in the one you do the best and promote that over time.
• Don’t be afraid of using these tools.  Instead, figure out which ones work the best for you.
• Learn about your audience before updating your status messages on social networks.  You don’t want to send the wrong signals to employers or friends.

‘Me 2.0′ is directed at gen Y, yet more and more evidence supports the idea that the ability to use social tools effectively to build career success isn’t directly correlated to demographics but rather with psychographics (head space) as well as affinity and access to technology. With that in mind, what can the ‘every person’ learn by picking up your book?
Every person can learn a little bit more about themselves from reading this book.  It’s also a source of inspiration and contains a proven set of tools that will work for anyone.  You don’t just learn about what’s available, you get to put it into practice.  A lot of research went into writing Me 2.0 and I think everyone will be challenged and see the potential of social media for personal brand building.

Dan’s book is in stores now and we’d love to get your comments on it, as well as any more tips you might have for building your personal brand using social networking. Time to share with the rest of the class..

Juliette

Overworked, Public, Economist – These are the 3 words Paul Krugman used to described himself as we sat back in Princeton, NJ for our interview. Add to that the titles ‘New York Times columnist’, ‘Princeton Professor of Economics’ and ‘2008 Nobel Prize laureate in Economics’ and you begin to get a sense of the man behind all of the big headlines.

In Part 2 of my conversation with Krugman, we discuss everything from the impact of the Yes We Can generation, to political nominations within the Obama administration to the small world theory.

You 2.0 meets the Yes We Can generation

An interview with Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman (Part 2)
By Juliette Powell

Where do you see the biggest impact of social networking and social media in the next 4 years?
Krugman: Some of it has already happened.

There have been some proposed appointments in the national security area, or at least floated appointments, that have essentially been torpedoed because the online community said no. ‘these guys are unacceptable!’ and rightly so.

There will be other areas affected but remember that basic policy formulation won’t come out of this stuff because it’s detailed. It will always require somebody sitting at a desk with lines of access and so on… But fast critique now demands that issues be brought to the front of the table when they were no being considered in the past.

Yes, the online community is gaining in power and influence and the effects are compounded because we realize it. Yes, it will be harder for this (Obama) administration to slip!

In the later Clinton years, the administration took on more of a managerial role and wasn’t as pro-corporate as a republican administration but less of a force for democratic change than one would have hoped.  That’s partly because they had a hostile congress but it’s also that there was no effective community saying: ‘Hey this is not what we elected you for!’ I think the Obama administration will have that kind of community and a good thing too!

Now that people all over the world have seen the impact that a single person can have using social networking technology – do you think that’s going to change the way that we view our own possibility to actually take control of our own destinies?

Krugman: I think there is something like that happening and it’s not just what is happening in America. What I hear a lot, is that many countries, including very oppressive regimes –

It starts as people having Facebook profiles just for friends, then something happens. It turns out that that same technology, that same involvement is also a way of getting political action together. People can be mobilized and I think it changes a lot of things.

In the 18th century, when we lived in small towns and everybody could participate and then we moved to this world where the power became very distant and news media far away, dictated how you saw the world. Now I don’t want to romanticize it but I think that it’s going to affect a lot of the world.

Take the famous Jacques Chirac quote: “The internet is an Anglo Saxon network’, that is no longer true at all. I watch my own links for my blog posts and I can see that we really are a small world. I’m seeing Chinese links, Korean links, Russian links. It’s a world now where this involvement has spread to very many cultures and indeed it is a very small world.

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I arrived in Princeton, New Jersey to interview Paul Krugman. I had been reading him for years in the Times and he was one of the reasons I had studied economics yet a sense of relief washed over me when I met a slightly harried Krugman in the unmarked video conferencing room reserved for our encounter.  The bearded genius with the earnest eyes greeted me warmly and told me he only had a few minutes to spare; his wife had just called because she was making pasta, the water was boiling and she wanted to know when to throw in the pasta and he wanted to get home before heading to Stockholm to pick up the coveted 2008 Nobel Prize in Economics. Krugman won for his ‘analysis of trade patterns and location of economic activity’. When I told him I’d share our interview with you on this blog, he graciously extended our allotted time together to answer more questions. The result is a multi-part Q and A.

In part 1, Krugman and I discuss topics ranging from the impact of the democratization of American politics on the connected masses to the role of social capital on the economic recovery. The full transcript of my Krugman interview, along with his videotaped responses will be posted here in the coming days.

An interview with Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman (Part 1)
By Juliette Powell

Given the current economic climate, what do you feel the role of building social and cultural capital plays in our recovery?

Krugman: We’ve gone thru an era of emphasis on individual initiative and individual rights. The “greed is good’ era, and now we’ve learned the hard way that that can go very wrong. 70 years ago Franklin D Roosevelt said: ‘We’ve always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals.’ Now we know that it’s bad economics.

We are now at a time when some of those virtues of cooperation, which is what social capital is about, have been rediscovered and with luck, this can be turned into something of lasting benefit, not just getting out of the recession.

For anybody who has followed Obama’s election and looked at the impact of his team’s online campaign, it is clear that many first time voters and people that wouldn’t have considered themselves politically inclined were empowered to self-organize and use social networking tools to help rock the vote. In your opinion, what kind of impact will people’s use of social media tools really have on the Obama administration’s decisions moving forward?

Krugman: We can’t be too romantic about this. Legislation still has to be drafted by teams of people putting every semi-colon in the right place. Economic crisis management will still be done by people sitting in government offices. Conversely, there is a democratization of the ability to express opinion and to make analysis. Here’s an example that most people wouldn’t be aware of:

We had a proposal for a financial bailout presented by Henry Paulson, the current Treasury Secretary. This was the voice of authority and most of the traditional media were highly respectful of it- not me - but most everyone else was. Yet very quickly, an enormous online discussion broke out and grew into a sense of outrage around the proposal. So the quality of the economics blogging around the economic bailout was incredible. You had a lot of smart people who knew a lot about economics but in the past wouldn’t have had any ability to get their views out quickly. They were not in official positions. The number of trained economists who also have newspaper columns is – one – me. These other people did not, but their discussion. I think it helped move the policy.

Within 3 weeks the treasury had effectively completely abandoned the original approach (to the economic bailout) because everyone who wasn’t in a position of power said: this doesn’t make sense!

We can see a lot of things like that happening in the future. Still, don’t underestimate the influence of people who can treat a congressman to luxurious dinners. Being online unfortunately is never going to do away with that entirely but there is a real democratization of access.

If you were one of the people who participated in the online discussion about the economic bailout, our healthcare system or the way to maximize the usefulness of the social tools put out by the Obama team, we want to hear your experiences or send us the name and blog of an online community member who helped you understand the issues better.

Keep checking in for Part 2 of my interview with Paul Krugman, where we discuss the impact of social media and social networking tools on everything from business to globalization to national security.

~> j*

While most of us feel powerless as we collectively witness the seemingly endless disintegration of our financial, economic and political institutions, I tend to forget that we do still have a considerable amount of power - the power to elect a new President who reflects the nation we aspire to be, and the power to choose the people who, on a day to day basis, shape the fabric of our lives. As more and more people lose faith in our institutions, may this forum be an opportunity to celebrate the real heroes in our lives.

Why invest in relationships?
Whether I’m looking for a new job, a new apartment or a new point of view, my friends, colleagues and acquaintances are an invaluable resource for gathering useful information.  As the value of markets go down, the value of our relationships to navigate these uncertain times goes up.

With a little help from your friends, your network has the ability to keep you connected to business and social opportunities that you would not be privy to otherwise. In a world where most people’s financial capital is getting scarcer by the day, one cannot overemphasize the importance of building your social capital.  Reinforcing the foundations of your relationships has always been a good idea; nowadays, it’s essential.

Luckily, thanks to social networking platforms, it’s easier than ever to manage and cultivate relationships. Take my friend Kitt Grant for instance. Kitt is a television producer on shows like 360 with Anderson Cooper and the Today show. Because of the nature of her job, she’s always looking for interesting people to book as show guests. Last year Kit became a member of  the ‘A Small World’ (ASW) social network and started looking through member profiles. The next thing I knew, she had befriended me and we’ve been looking for ways to add value to each other’s lives ever since. With her inquisitive nature and easy smile, a few minutes spent listening to Kitt talk about her job and you naturally want to start suggesting people who might be a good fit for her next tv segment. Far from being a one-sided relationship, Kitt took an immediate interest in my company, the Gathering Think Tank and even reviewed the first draft of my book. From that experience, I began to think about the awesome power a network can wield when the people within it work together. But let’s get back to the power of just 2 networked people for a moment.

Say you have lunch with a friend, and between the 2 of you, you share 25 friends and friends of friends. If I were to calculate the number of potential connections between you and your friend, it would work out to 2 to the power of 25 or over 33 million possible connections.

There may only be 2 people at the table, but there are 33 Million People In The Room!

Of course not all of these connections could humanely be explored in one lifetime so the trick is to invest in those relationships that have the highest probability of giving you the maximum return on your time investment.

How do you find the most valuable people in your network?
Start with the people you know on your favorite social network. As Kitt found out, friends and friends of friends are a lifeline when it comes to linking you quickly with the information you need to make the best decisions about your next steps. As you go through your friends’ online networks, notice who is a natural born information hub. These are the people to invest in and learn from when consciously building your social capital. If you’re not sure what you’re looking for, here are a few clues.

Invest in people who:

§    Care about others and really work to help others get ahead as they get ahead.
§    Pass on helpful and pertinent information.
§    Are tirelessly on the scene - and this doesn’t mean they attend lots of parties – they are actually the people producing the cool, worthwhile events, products and campaigns.
§    Know who they are and are very entertaining.
§    Are full of passion about what they do. It’s not about the money. It’s about changing the world!

Taking notes from Kitt’s winning networking strategy: once you’ve determined who to invest your time in, it’s in your best interest to stimulate and develop those relationships. With social networking tools, your entire network is at your fingertips.

How easy could it be to:

§    Forward along helpful articles, topical blog posts and other relevant information to various affinity groups within you network?
§   What about recommending suppliers or former co-workers?

All of these small things make a big impression. The resulting dividends on your time investment could be exponential. Chances are, your network is rife with high quality people who successfully build relationships and add value to your community.

I’d like to feature your real life stories about who they are. It could be you, a friend, a friend of a friend – whatever works!

Contact me at j (at) juliettepowell (dot) com or facebook me your stories today!

~ > j*