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Hashtags are meant for searching the twitter database. As you can see in the trending topics, hashtags are indicated with # followed by whatever a person feels or wants to state. For instance, #nowplaying (trending right now) indicates that people in twitter are writing it often (#nowplaying is a common twitter hashtag that people use to say what song they are currently listening to). Hashtags allow you to search your tweets in conjunction with other peoples tweets.

In another example, I could put #ayusongs in a tweet of mine to note that i am listening to an ayumi song. Searching #ayusongs in the search bar will then indicate all the times that I have mentioned it, as well as the times other people have as well.

Also, you can see the trending topics has topics without a hashtag, these are just common phrases that people may be unintentionally stating in their tweets.

You do not need to use a hastag to search it. For instance, typing #poem will give you tweets that people write about poems. A hastag tweet can be combined with @ replies as well. Some common hashtags on twitter are #followfriday (people mention notable users they like on twitter, on fridays), #musicmondays (same as nowplaying) and #justinbeiber (...)

People who have made a twitter account (and are new, or existing) should post their twitter names here so that the community can follow them. This will just be a good way for new people to get more integrated into the community. If i may start, my twitter username is zacharywan. (twitter.com/zacharywan)