In case you haven't heard, Arianna Huffington will showcase the GPS for the Soul mobile application in a world premiere at C2-MTL, a global event on commerce and creativity taking place under Montreal's spring sun from May 22 to May 25.
Arianna Huffington is a visionary. That's why we invited her to speak at C2-MTL in the first place, before we even heard about this new project. We asked her to speak in Montreal so that she could give us some insights on how to build successful, flexible business models in a changing and complex world where the average consumer's attention span seldom stretches beyond 140 characters.
Not content with being the first to have found a viable business model for a web media outlet, Arianna Huffington then succeeded in turning it into one of the most widely-read news sites in the world. As giants across industries are still desperately holding on to an obsolete status quo, Arianna single-handedly took a problem by the balls and turned it into an opportunity. A huge opportunity.
And now she might just be doing it again.
What does online news media have to do with a direct-to-consumer tool to help find your inner wisdom and creativity?
Beats me.
Taking new directions also takes a lot of guts. By definition, new ideas take time to grasp, and the visionary is, well, visionary. The fact that I don't get it just proves her point: Arianna knows exactly where she is going with this.
And I wouldn't be surprised to see this idea of a tool that engages consumers and readers on a personal level spur a following among other media outlets.
Arianna will be presenting the app and the idea behind the project on May 23, in a conversation moderated by renowned author and social media strategist Mitch Joel. No doubt Mitch will be digging deeper into these fascinating questions of constant reinvention, avoiding the beaten path, and littering it with all the skeptics in your way.
If all details are ironed out in time (fingers crossed!), the 1,200 or so C2-MTL participants will be the first and only ones to get to download the GPS for the Soul in its beta version.
Speaking of exclusive world premieres happening at C2-MTL...
I might as well mention that IBM has chosen to comment on its 2012 CEO study exclusively at C2-MTL on the day of its release.
And that C2-MTL will be hosting Fast Company's celebration of its 100 Most Creative People in Business of 2012. Past recipients of this consecration into the hall-of-coolness have included Tina Fey, Jay-Z, Facebook's Chris Cox, Nissan's Shio Nakamura, The Onion's Baratunde Thurston and Oprah Winfrey, not to mention Arianna Huffington. And yes, some of them will be there, mingling and breathing our charming Old-Montreal spring air.
No biggie.
So in case you're interested in being right smack in the middle of the worldwide conversation on commerce and creativity, juggling ideas with the likes of Francis Ford Coppola, Jonah Lehrer, Michael Eisner, Ian Schrager, Cirque du Soleil's Daniel Lamarre and Google Creative Lab's Robert Wong, this is what you'd be in for:
Yes, there are still (a few) tickets available, which you can book here if you hurry.
In short, the fact that Arianna Huffington chooses C2-MTL as the epicenter for the launch of her cherished new project is really quite a nice cherry on an already very sweet sundae.
And as we get ready to blast through the last few weeks leading up to the boldest event on commerce and creativity ever put together, I'm thinking I sure could need a GPS for my own little soul right about now.
Set in the creative hotbed of Montreal, C2-MTL MTL (for Commerce + Creativity, Montreal) is a three-day collaborative and immersive conference to inspire right + left brain thinking through a smorgasbord of exhibitions, multimedia presentations, conceptual spaces, projections, collaborative workshops and a creativity boot camp.
Curated by international creative company Sid Lee in collaboration with special creative partner Cirque du Soleil, content partners IBM and Fast Company, and powered by leading conference specialists HSM, C2-MTL is reinventing the business conference to find Creative Answers to Commercial Questions.
http://C2MTL.com
facebook.com/C2MTL
@C2MTL
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