This year, once again, the world's leaders will gather in New York at the United Nations to discuss the world's challenges. It is an annual gathering of the most powerful individuals in the world and this year it will have one important new attendee: YOU.

The popular social media website Mashable is hosting The Social Good Summit TODAY to kick off a week of major UN meetings with its only public event. The summit, which will be streamed live to a global online audience, will feature speakers who present a new unheard idea to address the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)--the UN's framework for making the world safer and healthier. More importantly, it will offer the chance for you to participate live by watching or interacting.

Following the Summit, the rest of the week will feature the UN Week Digital Media Lounge, "a fully wired base for digital journalists, NGO representatives, and bloggers." Building on the idea of how something that is often called "radical transparency" might inspire big changes in the world, the Social Good Summit is the latest in a trend for digitally enabled events that has also been brilliantly demonstrated by the TED conference (and regional TEDx conferences around the world).

TED was recently called "the new Harvard" by Wired magazine and also focuses on ways to engage audiences online directly with live events in a real and tangible way. There are some exciting ideas that will be shared this week, and thanks to Mashable and their partners we will be able to experience and contribute to them live. For bringing a potentially world-changing event to life for all of us, Mashable is Character Approved.

[Image: Social Good Summit]