Are functional hashtags on their way to your Facebook news feed?

According to the Wall Street Journal, the answer is yes – but not in the imminent future.

They quote people familiar with the matter who say that Facebook is “working on incorporating the hashtag,” but it’s unclear exactly how long the company has had these plans or how close they are to fully realizing the concept.

As you’re probably aware, Facebook lets users tag people using the @ symbol but does not support links when users use the #.

Besides the obvious plus of being able to organize and subsequently search and browse topics, hashtags would give Facebook another structure to build ads around. Plus, anyone looking to do any viral marketing on Facebook would welcome the chance to steer conversation using hashtags. It’s sure worked for Twitter.

Oh yeah, and your idiot cousin wouldn’t look so idiotic anymore when she uses hashtags on Facebook.