Please educate me. What’s the point of the # in social media?

[cantdrv55]

I see it a lot. When I click on any # link, it just takes me to the same place where I saw it in the first place and there’s no additional info. What am I missing?

[sugarwood]

It is called a "hashtag"
When you click the tag, it should display all other posts with the same tag
For example, clicking #porsche should show you all other posts that are also tagged with #porsche
The idea is you'll now see a bunch of porsche content posts (that have been tagged as such)

[stomachmonkey]

Indicates a keyword.

Used to index them.

Created by Twitter to track trending topics.

Spilled out to the rest of social media.

[sugarwood]

https://twitter.com/hashtag/Porsche

[sugarwood]

Originally Posted by stomachmonkey

Indicates a keyword.

Used to index them.

Created by Twitter to track trending topics.

Spilled out to the rest of social media.

It's not for indexing, it's for browsing by topic
Makes for a targeted user experience

[id10t]

For tagging various threads across various providers as related to a subject or subjects.

Possibly inspired by the html anchor tag and named anchors in a page (what lets you click a link at the top of the page and jump to some place in the middle of the page)

[Pazuzu]

No one else wants to?

OK, I will.

#okBoomer

[917_Langheck]

Now that twit'r is dead and can #sand perhaps # can reclaim it's prior meaning....

[Steve Carlton]

I thought it was a signal to cock my head to the side and play tic-tac-toe.

[oldE]

Originally Posted by 917_Langheck

Now that twit'r is dead and can #sand perhaps # can reclaim it's prior meaning....

Excuse me! It's not a "hashtag" it's not a "pound" . Every musician knows it's a "sharp"!

Now get off my lawn!

Best
Les

[id10t]

Originally Posted by oldE

Excuse me! It's not a "hashtag" it's not a "pound" . Every musician knows it's a "sharp"!

Now get off my lawn!

Best
Les

Ackshually ...


...

It is the octothorpe

[masraum]

It's a way of organizing (tagging) online activity so that you can find similar online activity.

I had a media application on my PC at one point. You could tag (not with a #, but same idea) movies with multiple tags.

For instance, you could tag one movie as sci-fi and mystery, another movie could be period and mystery, another movie could be sci-fi and comedy, and another movie could be sci-fi and dystopian.

Once you had your movies tagged, you could get in and go to a list of all of the mystery movies which would give you the one tagged as mystery and sci-fi and the pone tagged as mystery and period. Or you go to movies tagged as sci-fi which would give you the movie tagged as sci-fi and comedy and the movie tagged as sci-fi and dystopian.

hashtags are similar. The only problem which is probably also it's strength is that anyone can make up any tag they want. The tags aren't terribly useful unless they catch on, and are probably only useful if everyone really understands them and uses them appropriately.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by sugarwood

It's not for indexing, it's for browsing by topic
Makes for a targeted user experience

Actually, it's absolutely indexing, at least in IT terms. The Index allows you to browse by terms in the index. If you've got 1000 posts with various hashtags and combinations of hashtags, you can then go to the index and say "show me all posts with the hashtag XYZ", and you'll get those posts because the index contains a hashtag to post table.

[stomachmonkey]

Originally Posted by sugarwood

...it's for browsing by topic
Makes for a targeted user experience

Which is the exact function an index provides.

I don't think I've ever met someone so staggeringly confident in their own ignorance.

"A hashtag—written with a # symbol—is used to index keywords or topics on Twitter. This function was created on Twitter, and allows people to easily follow topics they are interested in."

https://help.twitter.com/en/using-twitter/how-to-use-hashtags

[masraum]

Pelican allows you to tag threads when you create them.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by stomachmonkey

Which is the exact function an index provides.

I don't think I've ever met someone so staggeringly confident in their own ignorance.

"A hashtag—written with a # symbol—is used to index keywords or topics on Twitter. This function was created on Twitter, and allows people to easily follow topics they are interested in."

https://help.twitter.com/en/using-twitter/how-to-use-hashtags

LMAO.

You and that website are wrong. It's for browsing topics!

[911 Rod]

This is a twitter thing?
Funny how many of us old guys didn't know (or care) what it was and never asked.

[Steve Carlton]

It's time we bite the bullet and modernize the pound sign. It should represent 0.453592 kilograms now. End the madness.

[masraum]

Originally Posted by Steve Carlton

It's time we bite the bullet and modernize the pound sign. It should represent 0.453592 kilograms now. End the madness.

Wait! (pun intended) Are we talking Avoirdupois pounds, troy pounds, or metric pounds?

[Steve Carlton]

Per 917_Langheck, it's sand pounds.