Dubai: There are five key characteristics necessary for successful social media leadership, students heard from, Sultan Saud Al Qasimi, a social media activist and non-resident fellow at the Dubai School of Government.

He spoke to students at the American University of Sharjah's inaugural student leadership conference held on campus recently.

In a recent Time magazine poll, readers voted Al Qasimi's Twitter page sixth best news feed, for his coverage of the ongoing uprisings in the Arab world.

On the list of the magazine's 140 overall best Twitter feeds, Al Qasimi ranked 25th.

"All of us social media users should keep in mind that without integrity our online activities can have a negative effect in reality," he said. "With social media people think of it as a virtual world with no real effect on the ground…which isn't true."

Addressing students on the topic of social media ethics, Al Qasimi relayed stories of his online social media coverage of recent Egyptian uprisings as they unfolded.

"After the Egypt events, I received e-mails from people thanking me and saying because they followed me their family members were able to avoid dangerous neighbourhoods," he said. "[But] without ethics nobody would have viewed me as a trusted source of news, because such a reputation is something you have to work on…it isn't built overnight."

Online integrity

Al Qasimi urged young social media activists to maintain their honesty and transparency if they seek to build up online integrity.

"Whatever you say on social media, make sure it's honest because honesty is one of the first characteristics of ethics," he said. "Also, be transparent in who you are and what you say and respect yourselves and others, even adversaries."

He added that both online and in reality people are judged on how they react to others. Therefore taking responsibility for one's posts is another key successful social media characteristic.

"You have to take ownership and responsibility of what you post online, even mistakes and this applies to you as students and graduates."