Imagine a spelling bee where the contestant is asked to spell the South American country Colombia and he or she spells "C-O-L-U-M-B-I-A."  If you're not Colombian, it may seem like just a harmless mistake from a middle schooler.

Now imagine a top executive at a major company or an A-list celebrity or professional athlete with millions of followers on social media who tweets about Colombia with a "u." How do Colombian affiliates, investors, Latino audience or fan base feel about that?

As someone who works in media and is half Colombian, the misspelling of the country of Colombia using a "u" may be on my radar more than the average American. Having worked for a major network, I have called out the mistake several times to some of the best editors I know.

To be clear, Columbia is the university, the sportswear company, and the capital city of the United States, Washington, D.C., the District of Columbia, not the beautiful, evolving South American country known for its incredible coffee and flowers, innovative businesses, green initiatives and agriculture, high literacy rate and high life expectancy -- not just its drug-ridden, tumultuous past.

If a half-Colombian is irked at the misspelling, I can only imagine how someone who is from Colombia feels. It may sound trivial to some, but it's legit -- so much so that a social media movement was launched last year when Carlos Pardo, a digital-media executive at Zemoga, a Bogotá-based digital agency, and Compass Porter Novelli, a public relations firm, partnered to launch Social Media Week Bogotá.

It was then that "It's Colombia, NOT Columbia" was born -- a social media movement where Facebook, Twitter and Instagram users correct big companies, celebrities and athletes using the hashtag #itscolombianotcolumbia, encouraging them to fix the mistake. It's not meant to be malicious but to prove a point that public figures should be more aware of the difference.

"'It's Colombia, NOT Columbia' is a social movement that promotes the beginning of a change on the perception held abroad on Colombia. Our main goal is to share the current positive features and qualities of our country and let everyone know that today we are in the spotlight of big investors from around the globe, thanks to the economic, social and cultural growth we have had in the past 15 years," according to its official Facebook page.

"The image that people had of the country was mostly because of what was seen in traditional media and in Hollywood. We don't want to deny Colombia's reality or its past, but we do want to concentrate on the good things. We think that social networks today have what traditional media had in the past to communicate these messages to people," Pardo told the Huffington Post in an earlier interview.

Who else has made the "Columbia" error?

According to the Wall Street Journal, this past year Virgin Mobile, P.F. Chang's and Lufthansa, socialite Paris Hilton (who opened a handbag store in Bogotá), and musicians Justin Bieber and Ozzy Osbourne have all misspelled the country.

The common misspelling has even bothered actor Antonio Banderas, who hails from Spain and was spotted with the "It's Colombia, NOT Columbia!" T-shirt. Colombian racing driver Gustavo Yacamán Aristizabal isn't fond of the error either and also sported the T-shirt to make a statement.

With top Colombian celebrities, such as Shakira, Juanes and Sofia Vergara, being featured on every major American network, more people are getting on the Colombian bandwagon and recognizing that the country and its people have a lot to offer and contribute to American society as well as its international scale.

"Pardo says Colombia is being written about so often in social media because celebrities as well as investors are finally interested in the country, and that thrills Colombians. Last year, Colombia attracted a record $16 billion in foreign investment," the WSJ added.