Twitter

  • Who uses it?: Everyone except your parents. Seriously, I don’t think I’ve ever seen someone’s parents on Twitter. I’ve seen every business, athlete, celebrity, college kid and so forth on here. But never a parent.
  • Pros: The absence of a stigma for posting 20 tweets in a five minute period. The ability to see celebrities get over a million retweets for a tweet about their breakfast. The ability to track what America is talking about through trends.
  • Cons: Your friends will always have more followers than you.

Facebook

  • Who uses it?: Older millennials, and their even older parents. Maybe even a grandparent or two who likes every one of your statuses, even though you are sure they don’t know what half of your statuses mean.
  • Pros: Sharing of all kinds of content, and ability to private message, instant message, and post. The ability to have over 1000 friends and actually talk to five of them.
  • Cons: The thread of arguments over gun rights, gay marriage, and euthanasia on the article you posted about cat sanctuaries (an important issue in its own right).

Instagram

  • Who uses it?: Basic people. Starbucks drinkers. Sunset watchers. Flower enthusiasts. Dog lovers. Selfie takers.
  • Pros: Between Man crush Monday, Transformation Tuesday, Woman Crush Wednesday, Throwback Thurday, Flashback Friday, Selfie Saturday, and Sabbath Sunday (made this one up as a way to shamelessly pander to my Christian college readers) the Gram has you covered for every day of the week.
  • Cons: Trying to get that 11th like. No one is a professional photographer, so the quality varies. #Nofilterbutiactuallyusedafilterwhichmakesmealiar.

LinkedIn

  • Who uses it?: College seniors that want an excuse not to spend time job-searching while appearing to be job-searching.
  • Pros: Great way to keep an updated record for your resume, connect with employers, and congratulate your friends on their way-cooler jobs.
  • Cons: You only check it when you get one of those emails that “So-and-so from Random Agency in Paraguay looked at your profile!” These emails also frighten you away from ever looking at your ex’s profile.

Pinterest

  • Who uses it?: Just about every woman on the planet. From the single college student pinning wedding dresses to the overworked professional who posts travel plans for imaginary vacations to the stay-at-home mom who just posts everything.
  • Pros: Private boards that allow only you to see your embarrassing links to wedding invitation ideas and photos of men holding kittens (it’s a thing. Look it up).
  • Cons: Probably the most lonely social media out there. Sure, there are ways to message other users and like posts, but no one really does that. It’s pretty much just spending hours looking at pictures.

Users also searched: Snapchat, Yik-Yak, Tumblr