Hashtags as Crowdsourcing: A Case Study of Arabic Hashtags on Twitter

Abstract

This mixed study aims to highlight the impact of social media in the Arab world, specifically Twitter’s impact on translators’ communities. For this purpose, the role of hashtags among translators will be examined by investigating one particular Arabic hashtag, its purpose, target users, and the classification of content. The hashtag is , #translator_serving_translator. 1) An online survey of six closed questions was employed and posted on Twitter, and 249 responses show that users are from fourteen Arab countries, and the majority is from Saudi Arabia. Hashtag users are translators, freelancers, or TS students. Some are active users who post tweets and answer questions, others only ask questions, and the rest only read tweets. The general attitude toward employing hashtags among translators’ communities was positive. 2) Employing a content analysis approach, the content is classified into two main categories of sharing information and seeking assistance with seven subcategories of each.