octothorpe

<font size="-1" face="arial, helvetica"> <p> <strong> <font color="#000066">Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for November 8, 2020 is:</font> </strong> </p> <p> <strong>octothorpe</strong> &#149; \AHK-tuh-thorp\&nbsp; &#149; <em>noun</em><br /> <p><strong>:</strong> the symbol #</p> </p> <p> <strong>Examples:</strong><br /> <p>"… Messina chose to use this symbol for collating Twitter searches in 2007 because he wanted a sign that could be input from a low-tech cellphone. He had two options: <em>octothorpe</em> or asterisk. He chose the former." — <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_eye/2014/12/17/_99_invisible_on_the_evolution_of_the_hashtag_by_roman_mars.html">Roman Mars, <em>Slate.com</em>, 17 Dec. 2014</a></p> <p>"<em>Shady Characters</em> explores the history of this and many other non-mainstream punctuation marks, such as the <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/interrobang">interrobang</a>, the <em>octothorpe</em> (that's the hash symbol), … and the <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ampersand">ampersand</a>." — <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/paperback-reviews-bark-inventing-individual-her-who-tom-ditto-shady-characters-10060703.html">Brandon Robshaw, <em>The Independent</em> (UK), 21 Feb. 2015</a></p> </p> <p> <strong>Did you know?</strong><br /> <p>A versatile symbol with many names (among them <em><a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hash%20mark">hash mark</a></em>, <em><a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/number%20sign">number sign</a></em>, and <em><a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pound%20sign">pound sign</a></em>), the octothorpe has become popularized in <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hashtag">hashtags</a>, those words or phrases prefixed by the symbol on Twitter and other social media especially to classify or categorize the accompanying text. The octothorpe is believed to have been adopted by