Reading Data Girl? Someone cares about hashtags

Seen the first episode of Red Data Girl yet? If you don't know what it's about, how about checking out the first part of our seasonal preview guide? Oh yeah, I was here to talk about drama. Internet drama, no less! Prepare yourselves.

GetReading, an online companion to the Reading Post, is asking its readers to pick a new hashtag to mark anything Reading-related on Twitter. They were previously using the short but sweet #rdg for all the hot gossip, what with #reading being used for inky words and #redding belonging to some guy named Otis. Can you see where this is going?

After the first episode of Red Data Girl was aired, the #rdg was absolutely flooded with Japanese text and pictures about the new anime, leaving the poor Reading citizens lost over where to find out if their trains have been delayed again. I commute into Reading (pronounced Redding) every day, so I unfortunately know a little too much about how bad the trains can be. Anyway, back on topic!

We all know that this isn't news in itself, but it's the reaction of GetReading that has gained it some rather unwanted attention. This is how their article begins:

Reading was the victim of a hostile twitter takeover yesterday when fans of a Japanese cartoon stole the rdg hashtag.

Oh, the hostility! The article later goes on to mention what Red Data Girl is and why thousands of Japanese folks were tweeting about it, so I'm not entirely sure why this is heading the text. It sure does have that tabloid grab-your-attention feel to it, so I'm going to pin it on that. The dark truth is that the Japanese could care less about Reading, and will likely never even learn it exists. Sorry.

The icing on the cake comes via a quote from "social media expert Heather Hughes", who attempts to explain what happened, as well as the meaning of the term "throttling". Fair enough, not everyone knows about that stuff. Hang on, what did you just say?

However it is a good idea to change the hashtag as it is likely to get hacked again.

Ruining the #rdg hashtag was one thing, but you guys hacked it? You monsters.

[via Twitter]