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Are you on Twitter? You know - the site that allows you answer that pressing question, What are you doing right now? to your friends, family and colleagues. (Oh... and you have to tell it in 140 characters or less.) The question you should ask yourself before tweeting is however, Does it matter what I'm doing? or Do people really want to know what I'm doing?

Hey, if you're a celebrity, sure, it would be great to be a fly on the wall and know what you as a favorite actor or athlete are up to. After all, most celebrities are too busy to do more than microblog from their cell phone.

But if you are Joe Blow, just another average guy, the reality is that tweeting that "it just rained after washing your car" is pretty pointless.

So here's some great advice on how to tweet effectively: Understand what it is you are sending out. According to Pear Analytics, a large random sample of tweets indicated that the average tweet is one of the following types of messages:

1. Pointless Babble -- Ex. I just washed my car. OR I just ate a sandwich.
2. Conversation -- I'm running late where do we meet?
3. Pass Along Value (often re-tweeted) -- This stock is hot!
4. Self Promotion
5. Spam

Of these five types, pointless babble makes up almost half of tweets. That's a lot of twit wasting tweets.

Pointless babble is just that unless you're Ozzy Ozbourne. After all, who can forget their first time watching him empty his own trash on his reality TV show? That was funny, but those mundane daily acts betwen you and I are of no interest to even your own mother.

The real question you must ask when considering a Tweet is, Who is my audience? Let's face it, most of us are NOT celebrities. The question of What are you doing is one that must be asked in reverse when you think about tweeting. Do people care what I'm doing? Tweeting that you just got a parking ticket on a street where the no parking sign was removed is a great tweet if you want to vent. Better yet, warn others of the street name and make it a Pass Along Value tweet.

Tweeting is non-filtered, folks. When you put it out there, everyone sees it. The my audience question has particular importance in this case. Twitter user "theconner" lost her job at Cisco right after landing it with this tweet: "Cisco just offered me a job! Now I have to weigh the utility of a fatty paycheck against the daily commute to San Jose and hating the work."

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