Early adopters are a critical component to any startup environment.  This particular demographic is unlike any that a company will face in the future.  It’s the early adopters who are first to interact with a company’s initial product or service.    It’s the early adopters who represent a company’s first fan or first critic.  It’s the early adopters who can open the eyes of the closed-minded entrepreneur.  It’s the early adopters who have the ability to drive a company into unforeseen directions.  It’s the early adopters who tell it like it is.  So what does it mean to be an early adopter?  Quite frankly — it means a lot.

For many technology enthusiasts, being an early adopter comes naturally.  This crowd eagerly jumps on beta releases, private invites, and all other forms of limited activation events — commonplace within the dot-com arena.  In an industry with so much transparency and so many options (the closest industry to being barrier free), it’s easy to see how powerful this group can be.  Twitter is a great example of how a group of early adopters trans