Formatting Tip: Hashtag versus Pound Sign

Posted November 10, 2020 by kddidit in Author Resources, Formatting Tips, Self-Editing, Writing


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Both the hashtag and the pound sign use the # symbol.

The hashtag only uses text on social media to group conversations around a particular category, i.e., a search on #orioles would find all references to these birds, making it easy to quickly find messages about a topic that interests you. If multiple words are used in a hashtag, they’re grouped together, i.e., #BlackLivesMatter. Be sure to use # in front of the word(s)!

The pound sign is much more versatile, primarily with numbers — weight followed by #, i.e., 145# or 145 pounds. Used with numbers, the # is placed in front of the number, i.e., #2 or a No. 2 pencil. It is also used by proofreaders to indicate where a space is needed between words — the # is placed just above two words that should be separated. Its usage in text is in hyperlinks to allow users to navigate to precise location on a page.

Formatting Tips started…

…as my way of dealing with a professional frustration with words that should have been capitalized or italicized, in quotes or not, what should be spelled out and what can be abbreviated, proper styling for the Latin names of plants, the proper formatting and usage of titles and more in manuscripts I was editing as well as books I was reviewing. It evolved into a sharing of information with y’all. I’m hoping you’ll share with us any questions you’ve had on this subject that have been a bête noir for you from either end.

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Hashtag, # Pound Sign, #, £
Credit to: Apple Dictionary.com; Dictionary.com: hashtag, pound sign; Lexico.com: hashtag, pound sign

A frog holding a heart to the left of a hashtag reading No Hate.

Hashtag: NoHate is under the CC0 license, via Pxhere.com.
Hand holding a no 2 pencil

Person Holding a Yellow Pencil is under the CC0 license, via PxFuel.

—

The #2 pencil is in popular usage.
Part of Grammar:
Noun;
Verb, intransitive & transitive

Plural for the noun and third person present verb: hashtags
Past tense or past participle: hashtagged
Gerund or present participle: hashtagging

Alternative: hash mark, hash

Noun 1, 2, 3, 4

Plural: pounds

Alternative: number sign [North American], hash [British, Irish], number key, pound key (Canada), № (to indicate # as a number)

#WordConfusion, #MeToo, #BlackLivesMatter

Noun:
A type of metadata tag used on social networks such as Twitter and Instagram and other microblogging services

  • [On social media websites] A word or phrase preceded by a hash mark (#), used within a message to identify a keyword or topic of interest and facilitate a search for it
  • A hash mark used in this way

A word or phrase preceded by a hash mark (#) or by the word hashtag, used to add wit or emphasis to a spoken or written statement

A hash mark or the word hashtag used in this way

Verb:
To add a hashtag to a word, topic, or message

Add a hashtag to (digital content) to identify it as concerning a specific topic

15#, #2, £35

[North American] The sign #, representing a pound as a unit of weight or mass 1

  • A symbol on the keypad of a telephone or computer keyboard 2
  • Used before a number to indicate it’s a figure

[United Kingdom] The sign £, representing a British pound sterling 3

[Printing, also space mark] A proofreader’s symbol used to indicate the need to insert space, as between two typed or printed words that have been run together

[HTML; also anchor name, jump marker, fragment identifier] An anchor identifier that allows the user to navigate within a page 4

Examples:
Noun:
The hashtag #sandiegofire was used to help coordinate an emergency response to the fire.

Hashtags allow users to apply dynamic, user-generated tagging that helps other users easily find messages with a specific theme or content.

People began using hashtags online as far back as 1988 on a platform called IRC — Internet Relay Chat.

Hashtags are used to group messages and other content into categories.

Hunt mistook an @ for a hashtag while tweeting derogatory thoughts about him.

Twitter automatically turns hashtagged words into links to a dynamic feed.

Verb, intransitive:
Her posts were always hashtagged.

A hashtag allows users to find all the posts that have been hashtagged using that hashtag.

Verb, transitive:
Someone on Twitter just hashtagged the film festival.

The athlete hashtagged his post #luckyman.

She hashtagged that picture “#unedited”, but it looks way too good to not have a filter.

People hashtag #TonightShow on Twitter, which promotes the show.

That deer must weigh 150#.

Enter your Social Security number, then press the #.

An American #2 pencil roughly corresponds to an HB pencil on the rest of the world’s scale.

The sign £ represents a pound sterling.

I much prefer the £35 sweater to the £25 one.

It adopted the £ as its party symbol to emphasize its hostility to the €, which is viewed by Washington as the only potential challenger to the supremacy of the $.

Example sentence showing how a pound sign is used in proofreading

Add a # after a slash mark at the end of an URL to navigate to an entry within that page.

Clicking <a href=”https://kddidit.com/2014/12/21/grammar-verbs/#verbDynamAccomp“> would take you to an entry in the post on Verbs to accomplishment verbs.

An anchor link would be written as <a href=”#verbDynamAccomp”> to allow a user to navigate within the same page.

Derivatives:
Noun: hashtagging
History of the Word:
  1. 1988 the £ was first used on Internet Relay Chat (IRC) to label groups and topics that were available across the entire network. It came from programmer culture because Stowe Boyd and his friends would refer to the symbol as the hash, not the pound sign.
    1. The hashtag was first brought to Twitter on August 23, 2007 by Chris Messina.
  2. Late 1960s, the term hash sign is found in South African writings.
  1. Roman times, as the symbol ℔, an abbreviation of the Roman term libra pondo, which translates as pound weight. The symbol was reduced for clarity as an overlay of two horizontal strokes “=” across two slash-like strokes “//”.
  2. An 1853 treatise on bookkeeping described # as a number symbol.
    1. In 1880 # mentioned was having a double meaning — number and pound in a bookkeeping text.
      1. 1917, a manual distinguishes between the use of the sign: number (written before a figure) and pounds (written after a figure).
    2. C. 1896 # was included in an instruction manual of the Blickensderfer model 5 typewriter that appears to refer to the symbol as the number mark.
    3. 1932, the US began using the phrase pound sign to refer to #.
  3. 1968, # was introduced on the bottom right button of touch-tone keypads, but that button was not extensively used until the advent of large scale voicemail (PBX systems, etc.) in the early 1980s.
  4. In the Roman Empire, the Latin letter L represented the libra pondo, a basic unit of weight, which is derived from the Latin word libra meaning scales or a balance.
    1. A cheque dated 7 January 1661 has a clearly discernible £ sign, the L with a cross bar.
    2. By 1694, the £ sign was in common use.
  5. 1994, URLs (Uniform Resource Locators) were defined in RFC 1738 by Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, and the URI working group of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).

C’mon, get it out of your system, bitch, whine, moan…which words are your pet peeves? Also, please note that I try to be as accurate as I can, but mistakes happen or I miss something. Email me if you find errors, so I can fix them…and we’ll all benefit!

Satisfy your curiosity about other Word Confusions by exploring the index. You may also want to explore Formatting Tips, Grammar Explanations, and/or the Properly Punctuated.

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Resources for Hashtag versus Pound Sign

Mairs, Jane. “Why is the Symbol # Called the Hashtag in Twitter?” Macmillan. Learner’s Dictionary. Ask the Editor. 19 Nov 2013. Web. 20 Sept 2020. <https://www.learnersdictionary.com/qa/why-is-the-symbol-called-the-hashtag-in-twitter>.

“Number Sign.” Wikipedia.org. 19 Sept 2020. Web. 20 Sept 2020. <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_sign>.

“The Ultimate List of the Most Popular Instagram Hashtags on the Planet.” Influencer Marketing Hub. n.d. Web. 20 Sept 2020. <https://influencermarketinghub.com/most-popular-instagram-hashtags/>

Pinterest Photo Credits:

Keyboard Numbers is under the Pixabay License, via Pixabay.

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