The hashtag turned 10 Wednesday, a decade after former Google designer Chris Messina first suggested the "pound sign" be used to connect groups on Twitter.
Since then the humble hashtag has gone on to become a global trend and universally accepted symbol being used on various other platforms including Facebook and Instagram.
Twitter alone sees an average of 125 million hashtags being shared daily, a far cry from 2007’s most tweeted hashtag that was used about 9,000 times, ABC News noted.
"Over the past 10 years it has become one of the most widely recognized and used symbols in the world," Twitter Australia managing director, Suzy Nicoletti, said, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. "It created new ways to communicate, to share, and to build communities."
Some of the most commonly used hashtags include #NowPlaying, #FollowFriday and #ThrowbackThursday while, according to The HuffPost, #TheWalkingDead has become the most popular show hashtag with #StarWars being the most universally used movie hashtag of all time.
The popularity of the symbol would certainly deem it lucrative, however Messina said on Quora he chose not to patent the hashtag for two reasons.
"Claiming a government-granted monopoly on the use of hashtags would have likely inhibited their adoption, which was the antithesis of what I was hoping for, which was broad-based adoption and support — across networks and mediums," he said.
The hashtag founder added that he was not interested in cashing in on money made off the popular symbol.
"They are born of the Internet, and should be owned by no one," he said, stating that the "value and satisfaction I derive from seeing my funny little hack used as widely as it is today is valuable enough for me to be relieved that I had the foresight not to try to lock down this stupidly simple but effective idea."