(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)

Since 2006, my team and I have searched high and low for examples of digital leadership from people like Wikipedia Founder Jimmy Wales, Wine Library TV’s Gary Vaynerchuk, and even studied President Barack Obama’s use of digital technology to win the election, and then the Nobel Peace Prize. From there, we turned to companies as far ranging as Cirque du Soleil, BT (formerly British Telecom), the TED conference and Best Buy. After lengthy interviews and in-depth analysis, a few simple patterns emerged. Here are some of the top rules for positioning yourself as a leader in the digital age. See if any of them surprise you:

Your Influence Is Greatest When You Are At The Center Of The Action.
Just being online isn’t enough. You need to get out there and start building bridges with several communities (professional organizations, industry organizations, minority-run organizations, woman’s organizations, tech meet-ups, innovation meet-ups, emerging market meet-ups etc.) Follow up with all new contacts via social networks. It is the easiest way to keep your new contacts abreast of your new developments, without having to constantly pester them with newsletters and emails. The more connected you are and are perceived to be, the more visibility you have- that’s a given.

What might not be as obvious is that being in the center of your network also gives you access to more information, sooner - a competitive edge with which to make better business decisions.

Your Online & Offline Presences Reinforce One Another.
Leverage your social capital (the power of those amazing friends who want to help you succeed! Just ask a question to your facebook/twitter and linkedin friends and see how many great responses you get- that’s your social capital at work). When your social capital starts affecting people outside of your networks, I refer to that in my first book, 33 Million People in The Room, as ‘cultural capital’ (you are now influencing the culture at large). Why? Most likely because you are perceived to be adding value to the lives of the people in your community. The next step is to translate your social connections into real-world influence.

Keep Strengthening Social Ties As Your Influence Spreads.

When your influence spreads beyond immediate social circles, your social capital turns into cultural capital, which has the power to attract financial success. Why? People and companies are attracted to ‘leaders’ and digital leadership is no different. The more you are perceived as an authentic leader within the culture, the more you become a magnet, an attractor. Offers come to you by the thousands. The old quandary changes from ‘how will I pay rent this month’ to ‘how do I decide which opportunities to pursue’.

Social Capital + Cultural Capital Attracts Financial Capital

Just think of the issues digital leaders like Gary Vaynerchuk must face daily for example. With about 1 million Twitter followers (depending on the day), Vaynerchuk’s success is astonishing, yet the pattern to his success is quite simple: social capital + cultural capital attracts financial capital. The proof in in the pudding so to speak- this year Vaynerchuk signed a 7 figure book deal and released his best selling book, ‘Crush It‘.

If the words “Mo’ Money, Mo’ Problems” come to mind:  wouldn’t you like to have those problems too?

‘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.

From International Space Station (ISS), 14 cities, Al Gore, U2, David Suzuki, Shakira, Matthew McConaughey, Salma Hayek and many more top celebrities will be taking part in a world premiere artistic event on October 9^th to raise awareness about the issues facing our planet’s water.

As I wrote about in my June 4th story in HuffingtonPost on September 30th, circus entrepreneur, Guy Laliberte, the founder of Cirque du Soleil and of the ONE DROP Foundation decided to become the first private explorer in space to engage in a Poetic Social Mission in Space. During his 12-day stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS), Laliberté’s unique social/humanitarian mission will have one clear purpose: to raise humanity’s awareness of water-related issues.

The Network Effect

The One Drop Foundation is using social networking to create a global domino effect using your tribes, network and sheer belief that together we can build better world!

Laliberté’s mission in space is dedicated to making an impact on how water, our most precious resource, is protected and shared. ONE DROP’s goal: to play a role in changing and influencing how safe water is shared and made accessible around the world.

Why unite to fight water crisis?

• Nearly a billion human beings do not have access to safe drinking water.
• More children die every year from drinking unclean water than in all of the world’s armed conflicts.
• Fully half of the world’s wetlands have disappeared since 1900.
• Collectively, the women of South Africa walk the equivalent of 16 trips to the moon and back each day just to collect water.

What is Moving Stars and Earth for Water event?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LdNj0kV9P4

On October 9 Laliberté intends to lead an artistic performance from orbit entitled Moving Stars and Earth for Water. The two-hour global show will link up with live performances and celebrity appearances from 14 cities worldwide. The whole endeavour will be streamed on ONE DROP’s website (http://www.onedrop.org) on October 9, 2009 at 8:00 p,m. EDT (GMT-4).

This once-in-a-lifetime artistic event will have at its core, a poetic tale to celebrate water written by Man Booker Prize award winner author Yann Martel (Life of Pi). The tale will be gradually revealed as the program takes us through 14 cities around the world such as NYC, Rio, Santa Monica, Mumbai, Tampa. It will bring together personalities such as Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, Dr. David Suzuki, Matthew McConaughey, Peter Gabriel, Salma Hayek, Shakira, Tatuya Ishii, U2, Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai and many others who will join their voices with Guy Laliberté and the ONE DROP Foundation to celebrate water.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gjFvACN3ayE

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. This live event will be presented around the world by a global community of artists representing all cultures and creative disciplines and wellknown personalities. Celebrated around the planet, the artists are singers, actors, filmmakers, photographers, dancers, acrobats, poets, etc. What they all have in common is a concern regarding access to water and a desire to illustrate this in their own distinctive way.

Here are some simple but effective ways you can help the ONE DROP foundation fight against water crisis:

On Facebook:

Add the 1 Drop Avatar to your account

Join  fan page

On Twitter:

Follow ONE DROP account

Add the 1 Drop Avatar to your account

Live Webcast:

Be part of history: Don’t miss the live broadcast event on www.onedrop.org on October 9, 2009 at 8:00 p,m. EDT (GMT-4).

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..

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.

This summer has been filled with new clients, lots of travel and new opportunities to work with the people I care about the most. On a personal note, I was fortunate to attend six weddings this summer, four of which weren’t just weddings, they turned out to be what I have begun to think of as ‘the twedding’.

You know you’re at a ‘twedding’ when:

1.    Your wedding invitations were sent via the micro-blogging site twitter.com.
2.    All aspects of your big day have been vetted by your twitter followers who suggest everything from wedding guests to wedding vendors.
3.    Members of the wedding party take ‘candid’ photographs and videos of the ceremony and upload them directly to twitpic and twitvid for community commenting.
4.    Your wedding becomes a trending topic on twitter.
5.    The groom tweets “I’m married” before kissing the bride.

As more and more engaged couples say ‘yes’ to social media, I wondered about the do’s and don’ts of ‘tweetiquette’. Is there a ‘twedding tweetiquette’? In this era of transparency and ‘ce-web-rity’, do couples secretly want us to ‘tweet their weddings’? Below, some of my favorite brides-to-be chime in with their thoughts:

‘We don’t intend to tweet or facebook only because we want our focus to be present and shared with the actual people in attendance‘, asserts bride-to-be Aviva Gayle. ‘We’re not really concerned with the virtual audience in the internet either. I’m sure if we were guests we’d feel differently, and want to exclaim “congrats” or “beautiful setting” or “great band” or “what-have-you!“‘

Isabel Walcott Hilborne, a bi-coastal online community consultant agrees: ‘Tweeting won’t be allowed at my wedding. I frown upon people telling others (who weren’t invited and perhaps are resentful) how much fun they are having!  I think it’s snobby - “I’m here and you weren’t invited!”  How rude.  Plus - live in the moment, don’t try to be elsewhere’.

Bride-to-be Nikki Stelma sees it differently: ‘I’d have to discuss it with my fiancé but we’re both very social so if one of us started tweeting at the wedding, the other would want to as well’, says Stelma, a New York based event coordinator. ‘There are so many details that happen during weddings that it is impossible to remember it all.

‘By opening an online discussion, you’re sharing your big day with everyone and they help you collect and immortalize all of the moments from multiple angles. When you think of it, it’s very intimate’.

Brody Bond, a creative director at a brand development agency in Baltimore who is getting married in a few weeks, couldn’t agree more: ‘It’s ok to be bold about who you are and what you do. This is an opt-in world, so you don’t need to worry too much about people being disinterested.’ Bond and his fiance Lisa have already set up a twitter hashtag (#Brisa) and a new twitter account (@BrisaBond) to keep friends up to speed on new wedding developments. No stranger to social media, Bond explains:

As always, it’s not about you. It’s about serving friends and family - especially those who aren’t there.One should always be thinking “what can I do to add value? How can I serve people?” In that way, social media helps to accomplish the intended purpose of wedding ceremonies more than the ceremony.

Bond has a habit of taking photos and “tweeting live” from friends’ weddings and rehearsals so it isn’t surprising that he has chosen to apply these same principles to his own wedding. You can check out Bond’s hilarious pre-wedding twitvid here.

If using social media to share your wedding is a new trend, what are the rules of engagement for those encouraging guests to tweet? Mindy Howard, Founder and Chief  Twit at TweetMyWedding.com sums up the wisdom of the crowd with her top 5 wedding ‘tweetiquette’ basics:

The wedding couple should not be tweeting the whole time - they should be engaging personally with their guests & family.

Use a ‘Tweeter of Honor’ and a hashtag (#) for the event, so everyone can participate, congratulate and tweet for the couple.

Never tweet anything you would not say out loud at a wedding.

Tweeting before and after the ceremony is acceptable, but never ever during the ceremony.

Do not tweet during vows, special songs/music or toasts during the reception. Tweeting while someone is speaking is like talking over them - Hold off 5min!

To Tweet or Not to Tweet
In this day & age including all of your online friends in your wedding via social media could push that guest list into previously unmanageable and unaffordable numbers yet for most of us, no matter how engaged in social media we are, the question remains: Are ‘tweddings’ ‘Twagic’ or ‘Twiumphant’?

What do you think?

Juliette Powell is an author, entrepreneur and contributing commentator with HuffingtonPost.com. Her first book: 33 Million People in the Room, (Financial Times Press, 2009) details how to successfully use digital media in business. Powell is co-founder of the Gathering Think Tank Inc., an innovation forum at the intersection of media, business, advertising and technology. A popular key note speaker and commentator, connect with her on Twitter and Facebook.

Taking cues straight from the President, this headline caught my eye: “Obama To Appoint Panel For Auto Recovery“. The story, in which writer Steven R. Hurst’s reports that the Obama administration “is establishing a presidential task force to direct the restructuring of General Motors Corp. and Chrysler LLC” is a great reminder of a basic life lesson:

You don’t have to be the leader of the free world to appoint an effective task force to reinvent yourself.

With record job losses and a flailing economy, how can a mere mortal survive these fickle tempests and reinvent himself? Chances are, if the car companies can’t go it alone, you probably can’t either, and you don’t have to. Just follow these easy steps:

1. Convene Your Own Advisory Board

“We are all stupid” wrote Mark Twain, “just on different subjects.” So with that little nugget of wisdom to get you started, begin by asking yourself who the top 10 influencers in your life are and list them. Next reach out to each one individually in their medium of choice. Using easy networking tools like facebook, twitter, linkedin etc. can save time and energy as you rally your troops. Whatever the means used, ask each person on your list to be on your personal advisory board then schedule a meeting.

Take notes because the network knows what you don’t know.

Social Media Week NY (SMW) is a great example of this process in action. The idea, born of a group of friends in the digital media space went from concept to implementation in just 3 weeks, under the leadership of one man, Toby Daniels. Daniels, 32, had just left a high profile job at MintDigital, an online digital platform and was looking to reinvent himself as a digital strategist.

Reinventing your career path at a time when most are fighting to save theirs might seem incredibly naive but where others remain paralyzed by the fear of change and uncertainty, Daniels began to connect the dots of his life and sow the seeds of opportunity. His first step was to convene an executive committee which consisted of academics like Jeremy Kagan- Strategy Consultant and Professor, Internet Marketing, Columbia Business School, as well as a bevy of forward thinking digital entrepreneurs like NUE: Agency’s Jesse Kirshbaum, Mashable’s Adam Hirsch and Tumblr’s David Karp. (In full disclosure, Daniels even asked me to join his executive committee to celebrate the community behind “33 Million People in the Room“, a book about leveraging social media to build social and cultural capital.)

2. Create a Vision and a Strategy Together

Remember that your preliminary advisory board meeting will set the tone for all other proceedings and needs to be more than just a meet and greet. It is the moment when you state your case about what you hope to accomplish and how each invited person fits into your vision. Share your goal and ask your advisory board to help you come up with a strategy complete with actionable items and time lines. Follow up online with a synopsis of your plan. Solicit invaluable feedback and implement tactical suggestions. If you don’t know how, ask. That is what your personal advisory board is there for.

Getting back to the Social Media Week example, Daniels created a mission statement that we could all buy-in to: “SMW aims to create an open and inclusive environment offering a series of free events, including workshops and panel discussions, and a platform for individuals, group and companies to organize their own activities.” Next, he suggested that our events would get far more press as part of a self-organized Social Media Week strategy than if we individually held stand alone events. Finally, he enlisted Tumblr to build the SMW website. With all of the week’s events listed in one place, a unified vision for SMW and how it might benefit the social media community, Daniels’ idea had became far more concrete.

3. Aggregate Your Networks and Spread The Word

People are generally willing to be of assistance when they have a clear idea of what might be required of them to do so. Delegate one specific task for each person in the group to deliver by a defined date, based on their individual resources. As we saw with the SMW example, you can’t know everything so get the most impact in terms of your time, influence and dollars by joining networks. These can be small networks of a few friends working together, or can even be the basis for new startups.

What started with Daniels’ idea, an Executive Committee and a clearly communicated vision of what could be accomplished if we pooled our resources, grew within a matter of weeks into dozens of original and free community events supported by partnerships with NY based companies like Razorfish, Fleishman Hillard, Deep Focus, For Your Imagination and Brooklyn based Drop.io. These in turn attracted higher profile alliances with media outlets such as the New York Times and Wired Magazine hosting Social Media Week events in their offices.

Adapt or Fail

In building his own personal brand through the birth of Social Media Week NY, Daniels understood a fundamental truth in life as in business: In order to survive within a social context, we must adapt or fail.

Daniel’s story could easily have been summarized as follows: He came, he lost and if novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald is to be believed, the story ends there. “There are no second acts in American lives.” In Fitzgerald’s era, if something went wrong in a person’s chosen career, there was no second chance to start it over again. These days, second acts can and do happen. After all, just ask Britney Spears, the US auto industry and Toby Daniels. (Special thanks to Marie-Chantale Turgeon for the ‘Reinvent Yourself Often” image.)