I love to meet Arianna Huffington. For a lady who made it in a couple of years to one of the absolute queens of online content, she stayed very much the Greek girl she initially started from. Giving a wide population the platform to share highly localized content, she took her Huffington Post to one of the most talked about content sites on the planet, and recently sold it to AOL.
Hearing Arianna speak is a nice. With a hilarious collection of quotes, and a delicious exotic accent, she takes the audience for a wild ride on the river of her thoughts.
A remarkable constant lately in her talks is the emphasis she puts on a couple of points you would not expect a figurehead to address on stage: the importance of having quality time, the refreshing benefit of using the “off” button on connecting devices, the no-charging rule in the bedroom, the importance of a family taking the time to dine together and the ridiculousness of hypothecating sleep for stressy work.
Arianne Huffington can talk about sleep, like a sommelier can talk about a delicious bottle of Bordeaux.
At the #canneslions, Arianne gave a view on what she labeled the four essential pillars for a better, humanized Internet. She did not talk about more IP addresses, or faster routers, better storage, more fiber and transcontinental backbones. She talked about very human values: Trust, authenticity, engagement and a relentless pursuit of happiness.
Something anchored on pillars from that caliber, cannot be wrong.