#Hashtag

#... The easiest way to group information online. Its original name is not 'hashtag' or 'hash symbol' but 'octothorpe'. Chris Messina saw the # as a thing, and grabbed at it. He first used the # in August, 2007. Soon after, a bush fire in California caused an evacuation of 1 million people. A friend of Messina's was "using twitter as an example of citizen journalism, where he was taking information from various sources, aggregating it on twitter and I asked him if he would considering using #Sadiegofire." (Messina). It basically took off from there. The # has become so popular, that even large charities use the # to promote their fund's on TV and on social media platforms. #IllRideWithYou and #PutYourBatsOut are some examples of hashtags going viral, having thousands if not millions using them at one point in time. Even Q&A on the ABC uses twitter and the # to get viewers to ask questions to the politicians on the panel. I don't think the # is going anywhere any time soon.

Reference: SBS2, The Feed. "Octothorpe: The History OF The HashTag | The Feed, YouTube video viewed 11/05/2015.