The complete guide to hashtags on social media

You may not know exactly what a hashtag is or what you can do with one. Who can create hashtags? What are they used for? This is your guide to #hashtags.

• So what is a hashtag? A type of metadata, Hashtags help users more easily navigate posts and engage in larger online conversations. Allow anyone to tag content on sites like Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

Hashtags are user-generated, not created by social media sites. While companies can make and sponsor their own hashtags, the tags themselves are not owned by any one company — and anyone with access to the internet can create one, hashtags are all about generating buzz and encouraging conversation.

• A brief history of hashtags

Hashtags as we know them have only existed for a few years. While hashes were used in Internet Relay Chat (IRC) in the ’90s to categorize items, they’ve taken off recently. The word “hashtag” was even added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2014 to recognize the tag’s widespread use.

The concept of tagging posts with hashes to denote more than category started in 2007 when designer Chris Messina suggested that Twitter users begin using the pound sign to denote posts for groups. Messina effectively became the first person to use a hashtag on the social media platform, the effects of which can still be felt around the internet today.

Shortly after Messina posted his landmark tweet, people began using hashtags to spread information regarding the 2007 San Diego wildfires. But it would still be several years before hashtags became super popular. Twitter began linking English hashtags in 2009 (turning them into clickable links that lead users to other similarly tagged tweets), and the site added support for Chinese and Japanese hashtags in 2011. Facebook eventually added support for hashtags in 2013. Nowadays, hashtags can be used almost anywhere.

Sites such as Instagram have slightly stricter rules regarding hashtags than other social media sites, particularly regarding tags relating to drug use. Facebook also has strict rules about illegal activities, and actively searches for posts tagged with references to child abuse, tag can contain letters, numbers, and underscores, and it isn’t case sensitive.

• Hashtags in popular culture

Back in 2013, Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake made fun of hashtag culture in a video that has since garnered over 30 million views on YouTube. Hashtags can be found as on-screen bugs in a variety of programming as well, encouraging viewers to engage with content outside of that time slot.

Hashtags have drastically changed the landscape of social media and popular culture in the last few years. They have created more engagement in news and media, and have inspired dozens of social movements and initiatives. While they can be annoying that more than three hashtags in one post is way too many, they are an influential part of the way we get and spread information in the digital age. So use ’em or don’t, it doesn’t matter to us, but know the potential they carry — and that they’re easier to use than you might expect.