By Deanna Zandt | Forbes
FORBES - Who would you name? We all say we despise those lists that get created to showcase influencers and hotshots in our field. But secretly, (a) we wish we were on them, (b) they didn’t pick the same small group of people all the time, and (c) we all know that people love lists, or else we wouldn’t keep making them. So, how can we break out of ruts that naming-games create?
We’ll create a new game.
Imagine if we could break out of the linear constraints that bind us when we’re making lists of favorite people. What if it were like a trading card game, where you got to pick your Babe Ruths, and also see who’s picked you? And what if we made one of the parameters of the game that you got more points for picking people in your field from underrepresented groups?
Thus, The #One4One Game has been born. Go to Twitter now, and, using the #one4one hashtag, tell the world who your One is.
The #One4One Game, created by me, Melissa Pierce, and Andrew Rasiej, asks digital influencers to name someone whose identity has a radically different trait as their One.
If you’re a dude, name a woman. If you’re white, name a person of color. If you’re straight, name an LGBTQ person. You get the picture. Arbitrary points will be assigned by anyone else playing the game– all you have to do is use the hashtag #one4one and share your One (or Ones!), and reply to others’ choices. The best (arbitrarily decided, of course) Ones will be archived on the game’s website, where six smart men have already started naming women they want to champion.
A bunch of us who work in the tech and information industries are tired of pointing out that women and people of color are missing from lists, from panels, from articles about the industry, and that it’s the same six straight white guys having conversations about the future of media, technology and, well, everything. And a lot of people are tired of hearing it. So, let’s jump in and do something, and, as Rachel Sklar has been pushing for, change the ratio.
Go to Twitter right now, before you even finish reading this post, and share your One.
The #One4One Game was borne out of the brouhaha surrounding Newsweek/Daily Beast’s list of 100 digital power brokers. Only 7 out of 100 were women, and there were even worst ratios for people of color.