Out of the friends that I interviewed, I found that the most common social media platforms used included Twitter, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, and LinkedIn. The most common ones used among my friends are Twitter and Instagram. Each one of these social media platforms were used for different types of outlets. When interviewing my friends, I asked what they typically used each site for and if there was an overlap of what one would post on one social media platform verses a different platform.

I found that for Twitter, tweeting casual updates about one’s day, following news platforms, and keeping up with close friends were the typical uses for this platform.

For Facebook I found that the majority of my friends use Facebook to keep up with family, old friends, watch food and animal videos, and keep up with news as well. My friends also noted that Facebook was much more private than Twitter or Instagram and that the majority of the friends they had on Facebook were close friends of theirs or family.

For Snapchat, my friends use this as a causal way to keep up with and interact with their friends. Though Snapchat has a news outlet, I found that my friends did not use it. Snapchat was a platform for casual pictures or videos or chats that would not hold value enough to be posted on a more permanent social media platform such as Instagram.

Instagram was used for pictures and videos that my friends said they wanted the most attention for. Good selfies, cute pics with friends, pretty pictures they might have taken, or pictures of the food they are eating are all things my friends tend to post on Instagram. Similarly, my friends mentioned having most of their Instagrams linked with Facebook so that the pictures they post on Instagram would also be posted on Facebook for their families to see. This is a good representation of the quality of content typically posted on Instagram.

LinkedIn was an exception to the social media platforms when I asked my friends about it. Though it is used by most, it is used less frequently and is typically only used for business and professional uses only.