• Three Exciting Announcements: This is the post where I announced NOLAlicious (now at it’s 15th edition and growing rapidly), my contract work with FSC Interactive on the Ochsner Health System social media strategy team and my segment on LPTV for social entrepreneurship. In 3 months, these 3 projects are among my favorite.
• Dear Future Me: Of all the future me’s I write, this one by far is my favorite. It was also a big step to share it, and I felt really brave for putting this foot forward and challenging myself to be more open and honest.
• Crisis Camp New Orleans: After the earthquake in Haiti, I knew I had to get involved. I looked around and asked friends and after about 72 hours heard about Crisis Camp. Since I was (and still am) new to New Orleans, I knew I needed to enlist someone to help make a local event like this a success and finding a great partner to do that was wonderful. Putting on Camps are a lot of work with a lot of reward and it was truly amazing the spirit of the people who came out that day to help create technology tools to help emergency response teams in Haiti.
• I’m the new MySpace Wall Street Journal Citizen Journalist for Davos! What is there even to say? I truly was overwhelmed and amazed by the response I go from friends all over the place who voted for me, supported me, sent me notes of encouragement. It was an opportunity of a lifetime and I can’t even being to describe the way that attending Davos changed my life and my perspective on the world. My biggest wish is to attend again, it was remarkable and huge thank you again to everyone for your support in helping make this dream come true.
  

• World Economic Forum Highlight Reel: Words and photos and videos can’t really describe the experience. Twitter and Facebook and MySpace and WSJ updates can’t give you the whole play-by-play. But I certainly tried best I could and it was tremendous to be a representative of those online communities, and a representative of New Orleans, and a true student of economics, political science and there soaking up the information at every turn.
• Forbes Woman: 20 Inspiring Women To Follow On Twitter. What an honor to be included on this list of power women! I also started getting into Twitter lists here to bring together groups of people and experiences. I’ve created relationships with a few of the other women on this list because we were connected here and that’s been a tremendous addition to my 2010.
• The Causemopolitan’s First Birthday! Need I say more? What a year it’s been. Here’s to many many more.
• My First Mardi Gras: Not only was it my first Mardi Gras (I had NO idea what I was getting into) but I also got to participate in My Mardi Gras Experience by Tom Martin and the Zehnder Communications team. It was amazing to ride in my first krewe (MUSES!), see the parades and experience Mardi Gras as a local. I’m really glad my experiences were captured for posterity and to look back on year from now.
• Living In Los Angeles: Such a bittersweet return to Los Angeles, a place I called home for 5 years and miss terribly. Yes I have this exciting and wonderful life in New Orleans and the two experiences juxtaposed against each other during a week-long trip to LA just floored me. I wrote a little something about that here…
• Tech Tools for Social Good: I spoke at CalTech and it was amazing, I love talking to students! A similar talk was given a week later at SXSW as a panel, but I did this one solo and it really meant a lot to me to be asked and I’m hoping to do a lot more talks as the year goes on. This was a great boost to get that ball rolling (plus it got me to LA!
• GNO 2.0 The Economic Revolution: I do as much as I can for New Orleans every day because of how much I care, and to be asked to be in this video was awesome. I can get overwhelmed with New Orleans, but this post and video remind me how much I sincerely love it here, and that’s always a good reminder in the day-to-day hustle of life.

Lagniappe: I did 8 “Cause It’s My Birthday” Interviews in January and they’re listed on the Cause It’s My Birthday section. I hope to do more. It was amazing to see people who took this idea and ran with it on their own!

While at the World Economic Forum in Davos, I walked by the Hub, a central meeting place for the Wall St. Journal writers and also where the Hub was interviewing Young Global Leaders, CEOs and social entrepreneurs about Davos and their experiences. They were gracious enough to ask to interview me and readers of The Causemopolitan might remember that I’m only now growing into liking myself on video. I’m being honest! It’s the third medium that I’m adjusting to (after writing and photos). Submitting the MySpace Journal video was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, it was really putting myself out there and without the help and support of friends here in New Orleans I don’t know that I would have had the courage to do it.

That said, big thank you to Edie Lush and Hub Culture for the interview above and for all you New Orleans readers out there, check out the interview starting around minute 3 where I really get into WHY I love New Orleans and what is of the most value in being here and being part of the community.

From The Hub’s Introduction:

Sloane V. Berrent, Founder of the Causemopolitan, is the winner of a contest through My Space and the Wall Street Journal to be a citizen journalist in Davos. She spent her time in Davos interviewing and blogging to her audience at Causemopolitan. Sloane also talks about her social entrepreneuship web show in New Orleans. Hub Culture journalist interviewed her at the Hub Pavilion in Davos.

For those who might have missed it, here is my MySpace Journal award-winning contest entry video:

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Continuing the thread about what an amazing opportunity it is to attend the World Economic Forum, see the highlight reel above from WEF’s YouTube channel featuring some of the biggest names in global leadership and governance in the world today.

The biggest names are heavily guarded with security and usually being whisked away to one room or another, but approachable if you can get their attention for just a moment. Walking down a hallway I’ve passed rooms where French President Sarkozy is meeting with the CEO of the World Economic Forum, Klaus Schwab. I walked into a room yesterday with South Korean President Lee Myung-bak in a briefing with BBC Correspondent Nik Gowing about his ambitions for his G20 leadership and his vision for South Korea’s future. I stumbled upon a seating area where I was looking to rest for 10 minutes in one open chair and instead entered into a conversation about nuclear proliferation and how to work with governments in developing countries to stop making nuclear weapons with the Founder of Space Adventures, Eric Anderson, the Founder of Operation Hope, John Bryant and the Crown Prince of Norway, Prince Haakon. I grabbed tea with the CEO of News Corp and then we, together, scoped out and finagled ourselves into the second row of a session where Former President Bill Clinton was speaking on the state of Haiti.

And that list only goes to about 4pm!

Each day is like that here. A glorious amount of over-information that I imagine will continue to permeate and sink in for months to come. Tomorrow is the final “official” day of panels. It’s hard to believe it will soon be over and I’ll be back in New Orleans, telling everyone about all the good New Orleans gospel I’ve been spreading to anyone who will listen about all New Orleans has to offer. But not yet. No sir, no yet. For now, I edit and upload videos, I edit and upload photos, I write and hyperlink blog posts to share with all of you. I sleep (barely) and eat (sometimes) and buck up to soak in all the Davos has to offer working through the exhaustion and the wall and the feeling that as much as I’m absorbing is as much as I’m missing.

I’m already plotting my return for 2011.

Don’t forget to watch my video interviews of some of the best and brightest leaders of today and tomorrow on the MySpace blog.

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Which leads me to my next point – the people here care very much. There are a lot of conversations about just about everything you could imagine. Water conservation and sustainable of global fisheries, the future of the middle east, what the World Cup in South Africa this summer can raise awareness of current hot topic issues in Africa, the crisis in Haiti. There are a million things happening in the world right now and chances are someone here is an expert in that field.

There is a dark side here too. Or rather a pessimism. Last year, 9 of the global CEOs of banks were no-shows. They couldn’t, wouldn’t, shouldn’t have shown their faces in the wake of such a catastrophic global financial meltdown and so weren’t here. Last year, the infamous and exclusive parties featuring vertical wine tastings or grand-cru french wines were canceled. It was deemed inappropriate to be lavish and thought to shed a negative light on the conference. CEOs of global companies meet here in Davos, this tucked away Swiss ski town and who knows what happens behind closed doors.

But let me say this. There is a line from a TED Talk that I love that goes, “It’s too late to be pessimistic. It’s too late to think we can do nothing. We must look forward to the future. We must look to building something greater than what we have today.”

That is the essence of Davos. Optimism that the work everyone is doing here is inspiring something greater for not just the next generation but 7 generations out. Among these leaders within their communities, I feel as if anything is possible for myself. I feel a freedom to be bold, to keep pushing forward, to have faith in what I believe is my own personal mission in life – helping people discover cause and ways to give back. Here, anything is possible and if I take away one lesson from Davos, it’s an almost “Santa Claus like spirit” where we believe what we want to believe. And so I choose to believe in hope. I choose to believe in the future. I choose to believe in you.

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We did it! Thanks to ALL OF YOU and my many other supporters, you have helped me win the opportunity to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland as the citizen journalist for MySpace and the Wall Street Journal.

You were the sixth judge. Every vote you cast, helped me with the community vote. The other judges were the CEO of MySpace, CEO of News International, Managing Editor of The Wall Street Journal, Head of Communications for the World Economic Forum and the winner from last year. You’re in good company.

I’m on a jet plane TODAY for Switzerland and I’ll be there all week representing all of you and meeting world leaders, global thinkers, CEOs and activists. Where can you catch all the blogging goodness? So glad you asked!

First, all posts (blogs, photos and video) start on the MySpace Journal page. Those will also be syndicated on The Wall Street Journal online.

After 24hours on those outlets, I will repurpose some of the content on my blog and you might see it around the web in other places too. And I’ll continue to blog and write about my experiences when I’m back. And of course, you can catch my up-to-the-minute updates on Twitter where I’m @sloane and will be using the hashtag #wef. Let me also recommend following @davos and their awesome Twitter list of WEFMedia.

If YOU were attending Davos, who would you want to meet? What question would you ask of our world’s leaders?

Ask me and I’ll do the digging and reporting for you. It’s going to be a whirlwind, but I can handle it. Don’t worry, I got this! Can’t wait to share my experiences with you.

Davos Bound,
Sloane

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Meet the MySpace Journal 2010 Winner
January 20, 2010

To attend the World Economic Forum in Davos is truly the opportunity of a lifetime. I would like to thank MySpace, the Wall St. Journal and the World Economic Forum for offering me this opportunity. I’d like to thank the judges, especially the 6th judge – YOU. So many amazing people in my online network voted for me and I wouldn’t have this opportunity without your support. Thank you.

As I talked about in my video entry for this contest, my life has changed dramatically this past year. I went from working in a technology startup in Los Angeles to traveling the world as a global volunteer, discovering my own online voice on my blog, The Causemopolitan and eventually, at the end of my travels, relocating to New Orleans to be part of a vibrant social entrepreneurship community and continuing movement to rebuild one of America’s greatest cities.

All of this has happened because I believe in humanity and I believe that we all have the power to make the world a better place. There is a mantra I have, “Every day inspire others and be inspired.” For each person who reaches out to me to say that they’ve been motivated to create change in the world, so too do I reach out to be mentored, inspired simply better overall each and every day.

It’s something I call “the cause-filled life.” Which means that everything I do, I work to incorporate cause. Whoa. I know that can seem like a huge step for most people who don’t know where to get started. So you know what I say? Start small, start anywhere, get involved with a cause or nonprofit and let it grow organically from there. Someone who is out of shape can’t go out and run a marathon without easing their way into it. And that starts with putting on walking shoes and walking out the door, down the driveway and to the end of the block. Cause is like that too. Make a $10 donation to support a friend’s fundraiser, volunteer one Saturday with your family. Time waits for no one. I believe people, for the most part and with the best intentions, talk themselves out of getting involved because they feel like they don’t have enough time or money to really make a difference. I make it my goal to be the voice that says; “Do it! Try it on for size and see where it goes!”

People ask how I could travel last year without making money. I say it’s not about what you make but what you spend. By cutting down on everyday costs and giving up the big things like a permanent address, I was free to volunteer and travel. It’s not for everyone. A year as a nomad was not an easy journey. As the year progressed, I realized there was so much to share and wanted to let people feel like they were volunteering with me in the Philippines, or canyoneering in Ecuador, or visiting temples in Burma, so I used social media tools to share my stories, and the stories of people I met to get the word out.

It’s not about being an expert in social media. It’s about understanding how online tools can bring people together and being willing to pick up and try new technologies. It’s finding the conversations happening online connecting with people on a personal level. It’s actively cultivating my networks and connecting others.

I wish I spoke a second language fluently. The superhero power I always say I would want is the ability to have a conversation with anyone in any language. Since I don’t have that skill, when people ask me how I managed to travel alone without incident, I simply say, “I speak people.” I believe that conversations are 80% tone and 20% language. If I can infer the tone and body language of someone, I’m doing ok and I can play it by ear from there.

To be a great citizen journalist, it’s not about being an expert or having the best equipment, and it’s not about being in the right place at the right time though both of those things help. Capturing stories is about humanity. Being a humanitarian used to sound like a big scary goal, then one day I realized that a humanitarian is someone who brings back humanity to people. That, I decided, was something I could do and so I try to write, take pictures and shoot videos that compliment that ethos. Partnering those intentions with story telling is what I think makes a good citizen journalist.

It’s important to be open to the experience. Coming from a place of “yes” can get you a lot further in life than being skeptical. It takes a certain amount of quantity to get to the quality and so not every experience is going to be great nor is every person. You have to take a little bit of both to get to the sweet spot. Once you realize that’s what life is really about it’s a lot sweeter.

In the past year I was a Kiva Fellow in the Philippines for 3 months, launched a campaign called Cause It’s My Birthday to celebrate birthdays as a chance to give instead of get and raise close to $20,000 for malaria nets in Ghana, and moved to a city I that I fell head over heels in love for, New Orleans. I launched a weekly newsletter (with two fellow former digital nomads) to help keep New Orleans fresh called NOLAlicious and am co-organizing a Crisis Camp New Orleans for this Saturday to help with the technological response to the devastating Earthquake that struck Haiti. I’m very involved in community organizing because I believe community is like family and I want to do right by my family and stick up for them and have them be willing to go to bat for me.

I believe actions speak louder than words. In all that I do, I think about action.

I am honored to go to Davos as an unofficial Ambassador for New Orleans have the opportunity to continue sharing my experiences. I’m deeply passionate about how economic development policies shape both the developing and the developed world combined to break the poverty cycle. I want to take the pulse of global leaders on how they feel about the future of the world economy after such a tough 2009. I’d like to hear more about how new technologies, like mobile, have the ability to change the way we do commerce and drive opportunity to build a more vibrant global middle class. I’m there to listen and to share as much information as I can with you so that from wherever you are, you feel like you’re there too and learning and coming on the journey with me.

What do you want to know? Who would you like to meet? Let me help make your dreams come true. Leave a comment in the forum here, connect with me on twitter at @sloane and tell me what you would be most excited about if you could attend Davos.

There is much more to come. I hope you’ll check back and stay tuned in for all the latest developments from the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland January 27-31, 2010.

Virtually yours,
Sloane

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Guess what? I’m the new MySpace and Wall Street Journal citizen journalist. To attend the World Economic Forum in Davos is truly the opportunity of a lifetime. I would like to thank MySpace, the Wall St. Journal and the World Economic Forum for offering me this opportunity. I’d like to thank the judges, especially the 6th judge – YOU. So many amazing people in my online network voted for me and I wouldn’t have this opportunity without your support. Thank you.

From the press release on the MySpace Journal blog:

LOS ANGELES – December 18, 2009 – MySpace today announced that Sloane Berrent, a 30-year-old resident of New Orleans, is the 2010 winner of its second annual “MySpace Citizen Journalist” competition. Berrent, who was chosen from a pool of contestants from the United States and the United Kingdom, will travel next week to the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos-Klosters, Switzerland as a special correspondent for MySpace, The Wall Street Journal and the World Economic Forum.

Berrent will join the Davos press corps and use the MySpace platform to report on conference news and interview world leaders about issues relevant to the global MySpace community. She will document her Davos experience via blogging/vlogging on MySpace (http://www.myspace.com/myspacejournal), and on The Wall Street Journal online.

“It has been a lifelong dream of mine to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos,” said Berrent. “It’s an incredible opportunity to report on world leaders and the future of the global economy. In the aftermath of the devastating earthquake in Haiti, I’d like to focus on the world’s role in the recovery effort. I’d also like to explore how economic development, specifically, microfinance and educational opportunity, play a role in changing the face of world economies and helping to break the poverty cycle.”

What do I get? What happens next?

As the winner of the “MySpace Citizen Journalist” competition, Berrent will receive:

· Invitations to the Young Global Leaders opening conference and various media events
· Attendance at private meetings with editors from the Wall Street Journal and News Corp executives
· The opportunity to document the experience in written and video blogs on MySpace and the Wall Street Journal online
· Syndication of her MySpace blog via WSJ.com

Much more to come, can’t wait to share my experience with you.

Your Causemopolian,
Sloane

P.S. Going to Davos? Know anyone who is? Leave a comment or email me at sloane (at) thecausemopolitan (dot) com.

Mobilize online community – GO! Friends, countrymen, lend me your votes! I have been named a finalist in a contest by MySpace and the Wall Street Journal to be a citizen journalist on their behalf at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland from January 27-31.

The what? The where? We’re getting there. But first, YOUR VOTE!

Click HERE to go to theMySpace.com/MySpaceJournal. You have to be logged into your MySpace account to vote. Once you’re logged in, click VOTE under my name and then SUBMIT. Then you’re done. Got it? Simple, huh? Awesome, thank you!

Appeal out of the way, let’s talk. What is this contest, why does it mean the world to me and what is the World Economic Forum?

1) The second year running, MySpace and the Wall Street Journal partner to send ONE citizen journalist to the World Economic Forum. Trip of a lifetime, you attend Davos and share your experience with the MySpace and WSJ communities through pictures, videos and blogging. (Sounds familiar long-time readers of The Causemopolitan doesn’t it – see now why this is so perfect for me)?

2) A political science and economic major/minor, I’ve long been a “geek” about economics. Factor in my CAUSEMOPOLITAN spirit, work in developing countries in 2009 including my Kiva Fellowship in the Philippines and now my commitment to economic development and social entrepreneurship in New Orleans and you can guess that Davos is the ultimate place I’ve always wanted to attend. And to be honest, I’ve always seen myself attending, I really believe from the bottom of my heart this is my year and I’ve never been better poised to take on this opportunity. Familiar with the global landscape, the names of major players on the international economic scene and the ability to interview, capture content and share that online – well, this is WHAT I DO. It’s me through and through, and I hope your votes, my video and my passion come through to the judges.

3) The World Economic Forum:

Purpose
Improving the state of the world requires catalysing global cooperation to address pressing challenges and future risks. Global cooperation in turn needs stakeholders from business, government, the media, science, religion, the arts and civil society to collaborate as a true community. To this end, the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting has engaged leaders from all walks of life to shape the global agenda at the start of the year for the last four decades.

If I get to attend, I hope you’ll learn more about this Forum, how the global economy affects all of us and how we can all take small steps every day to educate ourselves about global issues presented there. Think of it as a economic bootcamp, a chance to ask the questions you’ve always wanted to ask about global economies and much more content.

Want to help more than just your ONE vote?

Here’s How:
* Here’s a sample tweet: Check it out! @sloane is a finalist for the MySpace Journal competition to attend Davos, please vote for her! http://bit.ly/votesloane
* Post http://bit.ly/votesloane to your MySpace, Facebook and/or LinkedIn.
* Email your friends.

Thank you to EVERYONE already for your support.

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