Who is Arianna Huffington?
Earlier this week I had the great pleasure of seeing celebrated author and blogger Arianna Huffington, co-founder of the Huffington Post, speak at the Telus Centre for Performance and Learning in downtown Toronto.
Chatting with a good friend just prior to the event, I tried to explain to her who I was going to see. The conversation was a fraught with difficulty, as my friend was not really familiar with the Huffington Post – or online news aggregators or blogs or the internet, in general. It was an uphill conversation.
After all, if my friend wasn’t familiar with the Huffington Post website, how could I describe the woman at the helm? Who is Arianna Huffington? Is she a dedicated journalist? Is she a left-wing politician? A rich business owner? A media darling?
The answer: yes.
Arianna is fascinating speaker and eminently quotable. Once she started her lecture, I found myself frantically jotting down notes, scribbling madly as one bon mot after another came flowing effortlessly from the podium. The event was billed as “The Brave New World of the New Media: How technology is changing the way we think, learn, play, work and vote”. Well, yes. That about covers it.
The agenda was lively and diverse. Arianna covered a variety of topics, switching hats from journalism to politics to lifestyle, each time cleverly conveying jewels of wisdom:
Wearing her Newspaperwoman and Journalist Hat
Journalists sometimes get seduced by access. They get the “fly on the wall” detail, but miss the story. Example: China shut off the internet and gave access to select reporters. This was a significant moment in journalism. It's easier to snow a few reporters than thousands of internet users.
Why be citizen journalists? Why do all the online stuff? Answer: self expression is the new form of entertainment. This does not undermine the role of professional journalism. Media will always need journalists to edit the content, frame the stories and give them context.
What we need is a hybrid; a world that brings together the accuracy, fairness and content of traditional journalism as well as the immediacy, accessibility and transparency of new media.
Wearing her New Media Advocate Hat
With regard to traditional media vs. new media: we need to be better at biopsies, not autopsies. Old media is acting like nothing has changed, merging into traffic using a horse and buggy. We can't use an analog map in a digital world.
Traditional media is ADD: breaks the story and then...nothing. New media is OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder): stays on the story day after day after day.
Content follows the user. As a media outlet, we can't expect the world's eyeballs to come to us. We need to go to where the eyeballs are.
People don't consume, but share news. Citizen journalists contribute to the national conversation. New media gives a voice to the voiceless.
Wearing the Politician and Liberal Pundit Hat
The American middle class is in trouble. Wall Street got bailed out, but Main Street did not get the same treatment.
In the U.S., the markets are treated like a Victorian lady - “she” can't handle bad news.
Not everything is Right versus Left – that's a lazy way of looking at politics. We need to take responsibility for our content: objectivity not stupidity.
Instead of Hope, we need Hope 2.0. It's not enough to just cast your vote, people need to stay engaged and contribute if they want to realize change.
Wearing her Lifestyle Guru Hat
Surrounded by our devices, we must learn to disconnect too. Technology can move ahead of social adaptation. We should use technology, but not let it use us.
Unplug and recharge, especially at night. Remove your wireless devices as far away from the bed as possible. Create your own oasis and retain your humanity. Our most precious resource is ourselves.
Arianna had dinner with a man who bragged about only needing four hours of sleep a night. She quipped, “That's too bad. This dinner would have been a lot more interesting if you had gotten five.”
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So if you ask me now, who is Arianna Huffington? I’d answer: she's an author, a syndicated columnist, a new media advocate, a blogger, a humanist, a politician, a public speaker, a liberal pundit and a businesswoman. She’s the ultimate “all of the above”.
By Kerin Donahue, marketing coordinator at the Canadian Marketing Association
