Time Magazine's "Person of the Year" 1st Draft

Many people live in this world, and most of them are busy taking care of their own lives. However, some people go further to affect other people’s lives. They have a great influence on the crowd, actually affecting their lives. Time Magazine’s “Person of the Year” chooses a person who had the greatest influence on the world each year. It doesn’t matter whether they had a positive influence or negative influence. Last year, Mark Zuckerberg, the creator of Facebook, was named “Person of the Year” of 2010. The controversy starts about the appropriateness of Zuckerberg as “Person of the Year”. Some people argue that he is not the one. However, I say that there is no problem with Mark Zuckerberg being the “Person of the Year”.

     First, we have to know who exactly Mark Zuckerberg is and who his best competitor is. Zuckerberg created Facebook which is a social network. This brought a sensation to the entire world. It is easy to use and very convenient to talk with friends online. Now, lots of people in the whole world use Facebook to keep in touch with their friends. Also, there is even a movie called “Social Network” which is about the creation of Facebook. With these facts, we can easily assume that Mark had a great influence on the world.

     Then, who is his best competitor? Julian Assange, the spokesperson and the editor in chief of Wikileaks, was considered to be one of the candidates for the “Person of the Year”. Wikileaks is an international non-profit organization that publishes submissions of private, secret, and classified media from anonymous news sources and news leaks. Actually, Julian Assange received much more votes than Mark Zuckerberg. However, for some reason, Mark Zuckerberg was named the “Person of the Year” instead of Julian Assange. Julian was later named as the reader’s choice of “Person of the Year”.

     Because of this reason, some people argue that Julian Assange should have been the “Person of the Year” instead of Zuckerberg. We have to mainly discuss about two things to pick who is the best fit for the “Person of the Year”. First, we have to talk about how much they influenced the world. Zuckerberg influenced many people from various countries in the world by making a social network that connects people. For example, I didn’t use it at first. However, people who use Facebook kept increasing making me start Facebook also. I was surprised when I first started the Facebook, because there were many people who I know and even my friends in US who I wasn’t able to keep in touch unfortunately. In contrast, Julian Assange was not sensational as the Facebook. In fact, many people including me did not know about Assange before writing this essay. It is true that Assange had a big impact on the American society, but his popularity is somewhat limited to US.

     Next, there are some other issues rather than just how much they influenced the world. There can be political aspects, economical aspects and some other aspects to be considered with careful attention. If we consider this matter with all these aspects, it is clear that it is hard for Julian Assange to be Time Magazine’s “Person of the Year”. For example, if we consider with economical aspect, Zuckerberg was far more influential than Assange. Facebook created far more amount of economical effect than Wikileaks. Another example would be political aspect. Politically, Julian Assange and his Wikileaks are nuisances to US. Wikileaks reveals private, secret, and classified media from anonymous sources and news leaks. In contrast, Facebook enables easier communication between people which helps the idea of democracy in some way. Clearly, Time Magazine which is the major media in US would prefer Zuckerberg to Assange.

     It is true that Assange got much more votes and higher ratings than Zuckerberg. However, Time Magazine made the right choice. Wikileaks had a big influence, but Zuckerberg and his Facebook were much more influential to the entire world. Facebook was some kind of a revolution to the previously existing social networks. Furthermore, Facebook produced much more economical effects and was comfortable and desirable for the politics of US. There have been many conflicts about who should be the “Person of the Year” and some people even doubt the award itself. However, Time Magazine made the right choice in choosing Zuckerberg as “Person of the Year”. Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook which created a sensation to the world of communication, deserves this award.