Do you remember when it was just a humble “number sign”?Ten years ago today web designer Chris Messina tweeted “#barcamp” and with one post transformed the humble number (or pound) sign into the mighty “hashtag.”
how do you feel about using # (pound) for groups. As in #barcamp [msg]?
— Chris Messina 🐀 (@chrismessina) August 23, 2007
Today, people use the hashtag to organize posts by topic, allowing social media users to contribute to discussions, follow the news, and create communities on the internet around subjects of mutual interest. In honor of its big birthday, Twitter has created the hashtag #Hashtag10.
According to Twitter, each day 125 million hashtags are tweeted. Fans love them — #MTVHottest, #KCAMexico, #TeenChoice are topping the charts according to hashtagify.me. The most popular tweeted TV show hashtag is #TheWalkingDead, while the most popular movie hashtag is #StarWars, according to Twitter.
For those promoting political movements and causes the hashtag (#BlackLivesMatter, #IceBucketChallenge, #BringBackOurGirls) is now an indispensable part of their public relations arsenal. And nothing truly goes viral without its own hashtag. Remember #TheDress?
It’s become a part of our language, used across all social media platforms, and even outside of them. For humble (and not so humble) braggers, it’s hard to imagine what we would do without it, #firstworldproblems, #sorrynotsorry, #blessed, #tbh.
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