Number sign, Pound sign, Hashtag

 

Ok so it seems there is this thing called #hashtags. I didn't know what this was at first, I mean as far as I knew this little sign # meant numbers or pound on the telephone key pad, how did it turn into a hashtag?

A hashtag is a word or an unspaced phrase prefixed with the number sign ("#"). It is a form of metadata tag. Beginning July 2, 2009, Twitter began to hyperlink all hashtags in tweets to Twitter search results for the hashtagged word (and for the standard spelling of commonly misspelled words). In 2010, Twitter introduced "Trending Topics" on the Twitter front page, displaying hashtags that are rapidly becoming popular. Source Wikipedia.

 

This is from the Urban Dictionary:

Hashtag

If you have been on Twitter, you may have seen a "hashtag." To put it simply, a hash tag is simply a way for people to search for tweets that have a common topic and to begin a conversation. For example, if you search on #LOST (or #Lost or #lost, because it's not case-sensitive), you'll get a list of tweets related to the TV show. What you won't get are tweets that say "I lost my wallet yesterday" because "lost" isn't preceded by the hash tag.

Hashtags believed to have originated on Twitter but, interestingly enough, it is not a Twitter function. Some believe it began when the broken plane luckily landed in the Hudson River in early 2009, some Twitter user wrote a post and added #flight1549 to it. I have no idea who this person was, but somebody else would have read it and when he posted something about the incident, added #flight1549 to HIS tweet. For something like this, where tweets would have been flying fast and furiously, it wouldn't have taken long for this hash tag to go viral and suddenly thousands of people posting about it would have added it to their tweets as well. Then, if you wanted info on the situation, you could do a search on "#flight1549" and see everything that people had written about it.

Take this hashtag for example: #worstjobeverhad. This Hash tag would compel many others to share the worst jobs they've ever had, thus contributing to a fun conversation. It can be used for specific searches or individual twitters that begin them for their followers.

 

 

Well I started using #hashtags a few months ago, because I love social media and love learning new things. I also use these #hashtags for TV shows I like, I notice most of the TV shows I watch have #hashtags on the program so that we can Tweet about it.

 

From Wikipedia:

The first official integration between Twitter hashtags and television programs was during Comedy Central's March 15, 2011 roast of Donald Trump. Using the hashtag #TrumpRoast at the bottom of the screen, Twitter called it "the single deepest integration of a Twitter hashtag on air-ever." The promotion worked, as it generated the channel's most-watched Tuesday in history; the hashtag #trumproast was used over 27,000 times on Twitter during the show's initial broadcast.^[2]

 

There is of course a lot more info on the web about #hashtags, but I just was kind of interested in reading how it came about. So I am sure I will be learning more about using #hashtags and I use them more often.

Thanks for reading,

Diana