Conceiving a Twitter hashtag — and watching it boom
Joe Biden, Sarah Palin, debating (courtesy St. Louis Post-Dispatch)
This is the story of a Twitter hashtag – how it was born, how it grew and how it exploded.
To me, it’s a fascinating tick-tock on the power of social media and the multiplier effect as the network grabs hold. The hashtag was #vpdebate, which our newsroom conceived as a way to follow the tweets from the vice presidential debate in St. Louis last night.
We wanted non-Twitterers and Twitterers alike to benefit from what viewers had to say, so we planned to display “vpdebate” tweets on STLtoday.com’s politics page.
Fresh off the Online News Association conference in September, including a session on the use of Twitter in journalism, members of our newsroom discussed using a hashtag, settled on #vpdebate, and set about trying to see if we could get it to catch on. Read more
Kurt's Tweets- Bravo. RT @pwthornton: "Banning unsigned online comments undermines the media’s role as a forum for debate.” http://bit.ly/bmZsOn
- I would like to just take the two steps forward and skip the one step back. How about that? Would that be OK?
- Still seeking talented journalists to run #Patch sites in two south St. Louis County communities. Know anyone? http://ow.ly/2Axnv
- Waiting for a listings collector to give her more #Patch marketing cards. The work never stops.
- Realizing how woefully out of touch I have been with this part of the county. (@ Saint Louis Bread Company) http://4sq.com/5z5Bfh