As developed through her Instagram, ____________ uses this social media platform to convey her adventurous and multifaceted persona.  At first glance, ________'s biography demonstrates her academic drive as it states, "Stanford Class of 2018".  However, this bio does not fully capture her interests and personality.  Through pictures and videos, it is easy to recognize _______'s love for dancing.  She is on a dance team at the school and blends this influence with her other interests like global health in her photo from the Stanford Dance Marathon.  No two photos of _____'s are the same.  She is seen hanging with kangaroos, paddle boarding, and enjoying the Palo Alto sun with her friends to name a few photos.  Through her Instagram, she displays a very joyful and adaptable personality.

Fb

_____ (ß blank space baby) conveys an air of light-hearted professionalism on her Facebook profile. Clearly intelligent, _____ frequently posts (never using profanities) about how her pre-med major poses a surmountable challenge. Not afraid to show her light-hearted side, _____ shares comedic photos and memes to her friends on Facebook. _____ doesn't just devote her time to trivialities, and often reposts messages from charitable organisations and interest groups. _______ has an eclectic range of artistic interests, from classical music to our very own Taylor Swift. 

—'s Facebook profile portrays someone who is very social yet private. His wall is populated with pictures of outings and trips. Yet all of this content is posted by his friends. Except for their posts and pictures, he barely has any activity on the account at all. The "About" section of his profile is sparse and he has "liked" relatively few pages. — either doesn't use Facebook very much or prefers not to have a significant online persona. However, the content he has posted (primarily profile/cover pictures) presents his more social side. Almost all of his profile and cover pictures feature him and his friends. Further, the same groups of individuals appear in multiple pictures, suggesting a close knit group of friends. The profile also promotes the image of someone who is very passionate about sports, as many of the pictures feature his Rugby team and many of the pages he follows belong to athletes.  

The image that _____is trying to get across to the readers of her blog is presented immediately. It is not obscure or in the depths of the blog, but rather in the title of the blog itself. Right beneath the title, she included the line "enlightenment and entertainment by the dumb teenager for the dumb teenager". Automatically people should have a basic idea of what to expect. This is a teenage girl who acknowledges the adult perception of teenagers and decides to go with it. Clearly, she is not a dumb teenager, as presented by the blog. She is a teenager though, which she goes through some lengths to show. She presents the two sides of herself: the social teenager and the deep thinker. She is a college student—a Stanford one at that—and that is really the balance students want to maintain. For example, she has a post about her thoughts while reading Pride and Prejudice. This is a book that is common enough that if she talked about reading it, she would not come off as pretentious, but it is still a literary classic. In the ramble, she balances between some genuine, analytical thoughts and then some very "teenager-like" thoughts—the summary section at the bottom namely. It creates the "ideal" balance of a teenager and a student that people expect. 

Profile Analysis

In his presence on Facebook, with 160 hometown friends, at least 110 college friends, and over 500 total friends looking on, _________ cleverly uses his profile to represent his standing as a potentially professional stage performer. In preparation for such a public career, it is easy to see why ________ would so cleverly market himself from the start in such an appealing way. From his photos to his interests, _______ comes off as just the friendly, but slightly ambiguous performer one would look for. His cover photo, depicting him taking control of the stage in full costume, is just one of many performance pictures he showcases on his profile. These include him playing parts such as a king, a gentleman, and the infamous Stefon from Saturday Night Live. His profile picture is also evidence of his competence, depicting ______ in front of a large star, putting in the minds of those watching, how he may one day be the star. His additional information is short and to the point, but his TV show and film preferences are extensive and fun to see. _______ tells us only the basic information we need to know as future fans and is using incredible foresight to predict what he will want the public to know in the future. Each bright and cheerful picture reminds us of his presence and potential and his concise information reminds us he is a celebrity waiting to happen.

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Kayla Guillory

Stanford University | Class of 2018

B.S. Candidate | Mechanical Engineering

__________ uses social media to express her personality and interests. Most of her Facebook photos are of her with friends and family—I noticed that she is rarely by herself in any of them. This gives me the impression that she is family and friend oriented. Also, other people made most of the posts on her wall. With 759 friends, I get the impression that she is selective in who she allows to view her personal profile. Furthermore, she uses photos, likes, and posts to describe who she is rather than explicitly stating it in her "about" section. With respect to her interests, she is a member of groups that have to do with social issues, such as marriage equality and teacher rights.  Also, several of the movies, music, books, etc. that she likes are similar to those that are commonly liked by people her age, which makes it easier to relate to her. _________ does not share personal details on social media; instead, she tells the viewer more about herself through photos and posts, and allows the viewer to interpret them as they wish. _________decides what she wants her Facebook friends to know about her, and with that, she creatively uses her profile to make the statement: "This is me."

Profile Analysis

"­          " 's profile demonstrates himself as a quiet, talented, and cultured student. Immediately, one can tell this by his Twitter profile picture, where he is speaking at his high school graduation. Someone looking at a cursory glance can tell he is a high-achieving student. In his description, he even says "I'm a quiet guy." His retweets include new music from Kendrick Llamar, Kanye and more music from the R &B/ rap scene. He also shows interests in basketball through retweets of SportsCenter posts about basketball players. He also shows visual rhetoric through he's tweet of his acapella group at Stanford performing some holiday songs. Most noticeably, he demonstrates that he especially is passionate about black rights and equality. He retweets political comments about the Ferguson riots and police brutality, as well as showing support for the Stanford69 protests. "­                     "  does not tweet his own messages often, but when he does it's to post something he really finds interesting and important. With this Twitter profile, I see that "           " is a humble and intelligent student who is interested in equal rights and social change. 

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Annalee Monroe

Stanford University

Class of 2018

Swaggy P

Note: "it" will be used as the gender unspecific pronoun. 

Using pictures as its primary medium, Swaggy P presents its persona as quite an outgoing character; the only pictures you will find of it without people are its profile pictures. Otherwise, Swaggy P's omnipresent photographs of itself at all varieties of sports events provides reasoning for the possibility that it not only revels in school spirit and the support of Stanford's athletes, but also enjoys performing for large crowds. Additionally, its photos with dorm friends on weekend night outings, dressed either in rally gear or in fashionable/chic outfits, coupled with its lack of Facebook posts and comments, suggests that it loves socializing more in person and relies on social media simply for keeping its social image updated. Based on Swaggy P's Facebook profile, its friends can only gather its latest social appearance, however, cannot necessarily glean its day-to-day progress or lower-level activity.