I found a 90's phone that has a hashtag button on it, I thought Twitter invented hashtags?

Question

My mom was going through a box of her old stuff and she found one of those bulky phones that are from the 90's and it has a hashtag button!!! Like for real it has ( # ) on it!!! Like Twitter wasn't even invented yet so why did they need hashtag buttons???

Answer 1

Twitter did not invent "hashtags." What you know as a "hashtag" is a POUND SIGN. It's STILL a pound sign. If I write down that someone is 150#, it means they are 150 POUNDS. It's a honest to God sign that denotes WEIGHT. Usage on phones is secondary.

It was used on touch tone button phones as early as the 1980's. Today the pound sign is sometimes used to denote one is finished pressing all the buttons when dealing with voicemail phone trees as well.

Answer 2

no twitter didn't invent hashtags. the 90's phone did

Answer 3

It means "pound". Like when you enter a number then pound. In the 80s the "pound" in some cases meant "send" or "end of a sequences of numbers"
Just think, there is an entire generation of idiots who will wonder: "Why did they have a hashtag button on landline phones?" I hate this generation haha

Answer 4

It's called a pound sign, which was around a lot longer than hashtags.

Answer 5

Who Invented The Landline Phone

Answer 6

It was the redial button. And it used to be called a "pound sign" instead of "hashtag". You'd probably really be freaked out if you saw a rotary phone.

Answer 7

It's a pound sign

Answer 8

Hashtag (pound) button is used for extensions.

Answer 9

It s because someone time travelled back in time to put it on there.

Answer 10

its called an octothorpe