Hahstagging? What it is?
Before the emergence of social media, particularly Twitter, hashtagging wasn’t even a thing. The first hashtag was created by Chris Messina, a social technology expert who created the hashtag #barcamp back in August 2007.
His tweet read-
?how do you feel about using # (pound) for groups. As in #barcamp [msg]??
The idea behind this was comeing up with a way of gathering discussions and online exchanges regarding Barcamp, a technology unconference gathering activity that spans worldwide. Since the humble begins of the hashtag, this function has spread to almost every other social media platform as a function ie facebook to track trending news and Instagram to collate similar posts. Hashtags have become the way of tracing the latest news stories and events. Twitters immediacy has given it the power to broadcast news faster than traditional news programs are even able to catch them. Even so, twitter is now being implemented as a primary resource for legacy media – the tables have turned!
Take Egypt for example, in January 2011, activists in Egypt called for an uprising against government corruption and the rule of president Hosni Mubarak. On January 25, ‘the day of rage’, the hashtag, #jan25 was created and Egyptians took to the streets to protest. On January 27, in response the Egyptian Government cut off the internet entirely. However, twitter users had set up a phone number that allowed citizens to call up and record a message that would transcribed into a tweet using the hashtag. This is just one case that shows the power of social media and no matter how draconian the laws may be, social media and the power of people behind it can ignite change- in this case the resignation of Hosni Mubarak.