It’s one thing to write a good lead for a newspaper story, but it’s another to conjure up a good hashtag. That’s what we tried to do on Wednesday in preparation for an afternoon public hearing at Clark College.
The topic was a proposal for a controversial coal export terminal in Bellingham.
We needed a hashtag to create a microstream of sorts on Twitter while covering the hearings. That tag, a phrase with a “#” sign in front of it, allows people to filter their full feed into a smaller feed that can be more manageable, and it can lend itself to creating conversations online, albeit in bursts of up to 140 characters.
“How about #vanwacoal or #wacoalterminals?” someone offers up in a meeting to plan for coverage of the event.
“Nah, too long.”
“Beyondcoal?”
“No, that’s being used as a slogan by the anti-coal folks. We don’t want to take sides.”
