Make the Noise

The term “Litmus Test” has been colloquially used to refer to a simple / non-complex test, with a pass or fail.  For The Social Media Litmus Test, I propose (at this moment in time) a simple question to serve as the litmus paper: “Are you on Twitter?”

When social networks were all the buzz I would have recommended the question “Are you on MySpace?.”  In the 90’s, the question may have been “Are you on Geocities?” or  even a farther throw-back, “Are you on AOL?”  And next year, the litmus test for your social-media savvy level may be a completely different question.  While I realize Twitter is just the latest trend,  if you want to be successful in any industry today, you must know and be involved with the latest wave that is changing the game.

This past week I had the rare opportunity to test two different groups back to back, opposites of each other both dynamically and demographically.  On Wednesday, I spoke with a group of college students about new media, and on Thursday I attended a tech-dinner on the gaming industry with a group of individuals that were well established and had been in the industry for years.

During each of these sessions I conducted my mini experiment and the results were shocking, revealing, and proof that these two separate generations haven’t kept up with the trends.

I’ll provide a full analysis of these two groups and others in the weeks to come.

Stay Tuned!