It's All About the Hashtag!

Today the 23rd August 2017 is the 10th anniversary of the first hashtag symbol used on Twitter. We have been tweeting our top 10 #s and tweets of the last 10 years over the last 10 hours. If you have missed our #10YearsIn10Hours tweets then not to worry as we have compiled them into this post.

Caution if you are averse to the overuse of hashtags then please do look away now.

  • Number 1 – In honour of the man who started the hashtag phenomenon. The one and only Chris Messina with his tweet:“how do you feel about using # (pound) for groups. As in #barcamp [msg]?” Which received 2,186 retweets to date in comparison to the 2014 Oscars tweet at 3.4 Million but on to that one later.
  • Number 2 – Who could forget the moment that Usain Bolt won his Olympic gold medal and broke the world record for the 100m men’s sprint which was recorded on Twitter under the popular hashtag #Beijing2008
  • Number 3 – As recorded as the most mentioned celebrity on Twitter, it would be rude of us not to add him to our top 10 hashtag list with his insightful post back in 2009. “If chickens could say love me love me that would be awesome.” This obscene tweet earned the superstar 42,846 retweets and 24,681 likes – madness in comparison to Chris Messina’s first hashtag tweet.
  • Number 4 – In 2010 Universal Live joined the world of Twitter. #dank, #nevergiveup and #worldcup were trending hashtags for that year
  • Number 5 – We are back to 2011 with the birth of #ThrowbackThursday which has taken up popular use by marketers across the world and still being heavily used today. Here’s our #TBT of Hire Manager, Stuart from 2011.
  • Number 6 – Do you remember when #YOLO didn’t exist? Well no, nor do we. 2012 was the year that launched it into our lives and now into the dictionary. Although most would be under the impression that Drake was the birth father of the word yolo this simply is not true in fact there were a number of yolo references pre 2012 and the oldest that we have found is – Yolo County, California established in 1850.
  • Number 7 – This tweet from 2013 made the team at Universal Live chuckle so earned its space onto the 10 years in 10 hours list and really does remind you what Twitter is all about. “My office password’s been hacked. That’s the third time I’ve had to rename the cat.” – Twitter user @liz_buckley
Stu
  • Number 8 – This was the selfie to end all selfies! Each year celebrity royalty comes together to celebrate those most talented within their chosen field as well as enjoying a couple of tipples. What is not often seen is a “real” photo awash with those most famous Hollywood faces enjoying the event. Well, that was until Ellen DeGeneres and the gang came together for the 2014 awards show. Her post entitled “If only Bradley’s arm was longer. Best photo ever. #Oscars” has been retweeted  3,4400,270 times (and counting) earning it the Twitter Oscar of the most retweeted post ever!
  • Number 9 – #TheDress was not just any dress, oh no this dress wagered fashion war. Was it white and gold or was it blue and black? The world was divided. But, lucky for life as we know it the scientific brainiacs made the great discovery and to quote: “that as we live our lives, our brains devise strategies for working out the true colours of objects in different situations. But because we have different experiences, our brain models differ too. People who stay up later have more experience of artificial lighting which has more reddish light in it. Their brains may then be accustomed to correcting from reddish illumination. Take these colours out of the dress image, and it appears blue and black.” 10 million tweets mentioned #TheDress in 2015. What colours did you see?
  • Number 10 – Finally we give you the last of our 10 years in 10 hours contributor. 2016 is our last stop on our trip down hashtag memory lane so we wanted to end with the craze of the century….#PokemonGo. Who would have thought years after Pokémon fell out of popular culture that it would make such a triumphant comeback? And what a way to do it, with over 500 million downloads of the app (and counting!) the numbers do not lie – augmented and virtual reality are here to stay.
  • That’s all folks our 10 years in 10 hours has come to the end and we hope that you have found it insightful. All there is to say is long live the hashtag! #OverAndOut