The hashtag was invented in 2007. A former Google employee named Chris Messina came up with the idea to group information with a # sign. I admit I am probably one of the last four people on the planet to get on the hashtag bandwagon. I still don’t quite get it, who really looks up a hashtag for information?

As an experiment I tried #workout. #dog, #education and I didn’t find anything particularly appealing. While #Canada brought up a few images of things Canadian on the first page of images I clicked on, there were also many irrelevant selfies that were taken in Canada. #kettlebell did result in more interesting videos and pictures.

I had to start using a hashtag because my friends and I are doing 100daysofhappiness. We created #100daysofhappinessLWS to group our pictures (LWS for laughing with sound…everyone asks). At least once a week I like to click on the hashtag and see the conglomeration of our happiness and how we’ve stuck with it for over two months now. More recently, I followed the suggestion of WordPress and added #wponthego for a post I submitted from my smartphone. It’s interesting getting this grouping of posts that I might not see otherwise so I can get on board with the hashtag idea for certain projects or perhaps relevant things going on at the time, but are all the hashtags really used?

How do you decide which words are hashtagged? Is it just free advertising if you have a brand? If you use hashtags in your facebook or twitter posts…why????

Of course, I am now establishing #possibilityandlight. I’m thrilled that it doesn’t already exist!

Do hashtags give people power to unite, or at least give us a little bit of control and/or fame?

I leave you with this video from Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake.