SXSW is supposed to be the best place to get tastemakers’ attention and woo them into your product/service/whatever’s clutches for the foreseeable future, and that can only mean one thing: street teams handing out fliers. As someone who street teamed for a year of my life, I wanted to relay the following:

1. People aren’t very kind to street teamers. You can’t control everyone, but you can control yourself, so be nice. Or at least don’t go out of your way to be a jerk.
2. They’re probably not getting paid (enough). I was paid in concert tickets and status, and even though it was worth it to me at the time, it didn’t seem like it when people would throw handouts back at me.
3. They’re probably not trained. I talked to a girl yesterday who didn’t know anything about what she was promoting. Is that ideal? Absolutely not. But did I tell her that the flier was terrible or that the thing that it was promoting wasn’t compelling at all and that “getting likes on Facebook so someone uses it to make stuff” isn’t a good goal? No. I didn’t. (see #4)
4. Be a decent human. Just take the flier. Unless you’re prone to paper cuts, it will #literally not hurt you. You don’t have to keep it, but also don’t throw it on the ground. Who knows, you might even like what it says.