Updated 13/06: Facebook has confirmed it will be rolling out hashtags for users, starting from today.

The latest news out of Facebook HQ (it seems like there's something new every week at the moment!) is that the social giant is considering trialling the use of hashtags, the now ubiquitous topic grouping symbol popularised by rival Twitter.

If Facebook does go ahead with the idea, rumoured to be intended to work alongside the new graph search feature to make topics and conversations easier to find, it will join Twitter, Pinterest, Google+ and its own sepia-soaked photosharer Instagram as a user of the device.

Bearing all that in mind, we thought it would be worth having a refresher in how best to use hashtags for marketing on all the major platforms. Of course to really get to grips with marketing on Twitter, Facebook and the like, our Social Media Workshop is ideal.

If you want to see hashtags in action, follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest.

So how do we go about using hashtags for marketing? Well firstly we need to distinguish between two different ways they are used by businesses across social media:

1/ Using Existing Hashtags

One very simple and popular way to use hashtags for marketing businesses is to find trending hashtags related to your specific niche and use them in your posts.

If for example, you write about Project Management, you could use the hashtags #pm #pmot to open up your posts to a wider audience who may be searching for content placed under that grouping.

Going down this route is generally seen to be the 'safest' option when using hashtags but you still need to be careful.

It seems like social media is accused of ruining the world on an almost daily basis in news and blogs across the web, for a multiplicity of reasons: it's causing the breakdown of relationships, breeding a culture of narcissistic and parasitic youths and shrinking our attention spans to the point that we can barely even finish a senten...

Awful joke aside, this is a serious barrage of allegations to be levelled against what is arguably one of the biggest communication technology developments there has ever been.

And it's just plain wrong. Social media is not ruining your life, my life or the world.

In a lot of ways, it's doing the exact opposite - it's making everything a whole lot better.

Although our Social Media Training focusses on the potential business and marketing uses of social media, it can be used for a whole lot more.

So let's take a look at some of the most often quoted reasons that social media is Satan in technological form and try to debunk these myths.

Updated Updated Update: Instagram have removed the ability to delete your account. We're not sure if this temporary or not, or whether they are hoping that people trying to delete their account forget by the time the function is back up.

Updated Update: Instagram are nowreverting back to the original terms of service. So it was all a nice bit of PR over a quiet period then!

Update: Instagram haveposted a responsein which they say they 'are listening' and as such they will be rewording their terms of service. It will be interesting to see if this combats some of the fears that Instagram users have.

Yesterday saw the release ofInstagram's new terms of servicewhich, it's safe to say, have riled up a fair few people.

The objectionable section of the release refers to the effective ownership of your photos by Instagram (and therefore Facebook) which allows them the right to sell said photos on to third-party advertisers.

It has sparked a debate about onlineproprietorship and 'open-source' content and what the legal implications of such arrangements are, as well as spurring a mass boycotting of the service.

You can learn more about terms of service andproprietaryrights on our Social Media Courses.

So if you too are concerned about having your photos left to the mercy of

Instagram's ad team,

there's really only one option. Delete your account. Delete it now.

Wait! Stop!Before you do that have a long, hard think.

As happens when any service updates their terms everyone is

jumping up and down in anger but there are definitely some reasons to hang around:

1. It's most likely to just be legal speak. Instagram are unlikely to start running a ShutterStock service, it's just a way of opening up the service for future use (a bit like Google's recent privacy update).
2. If you've built up a strong presence/ following on Instagram you will lose that in it's entirety! It's almost impossible to migrate 100% of followers from one network to another.
3. If you weretrulyworried about privacy before then you never would have uploaded your images to the internet in the first place.
4. "If you're not paying for something, you're not the customer; you're the product being sold."

If you're still convinced deletion is the way to go then read on to find out how...