Step 1 : Introduction to the question "Octothorpe is another name for what common computer keyboard symbol?"
The # symbol is commonly called the pound sign, number sign and more recently the hashtag. However, its official name is the the octothorpe. The word was invented in the same laboratories where the telephone came from. The scientists at Bell Laboratories modified the telephone keypad in the early 1960s and added the # symbol to send instructions to the telephone operating system. According to one report, Bell Lab employee Don MacPherson named it after the Olympian Jim Thorpe. However, another former employee claims it was a nonsense word that was a joke.
