Was Mark Zuckerberg the best choice for Time Magazine's 2010 person of the year?

Good question! I don't think he deserved it even though he's connected millions. He only created Facebook just like Tom created MySpace.

Facebook is just a MySpace with less drama and more safety, I use Facebook quite often though! It's popular among all my family and friends too, but when you take a look at the past choices for Time Magazine's "Person of The Year" award they all did things way bigger than just creating some website. Among some of the people that won "Person of The Year" were: Barack Obama (2008), Jeff Bezos (1999), David Ho (1996), and many more.

As you can see these are people that actually did something great to make it on the cover of "Time Magazine", I just can't see Mark Zuckerberg being in that list.

I might have gone with one or both: Anderson Cooper and Sanjay Gupta. They were both in Haiti after the earthquake, tirelessly reporting on it and hands-on helping for what seemed like months. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is CNN's Chief Medical Correspondent and he's also a neurosurgeon.

He broke from his news reporting to actually be a doctor---on a floating hospital--and he saved a girl's life: "Dr. Sanjay Gupta, in Haiti for CNN to cover the earthquake aftermath, was contacted by officials from the U.S.S. Carl Vinson early Monday and asked to provide his neurosurgical skills to aid a 12-year-old girl with a head injury who’d been evacuated to the ship. The Vinson has a fully equipped operating room and a general surgeon, but no neurosurgeon. The ship’s surgeon had seen reports that Gupta was in Haiti and reached out to CNN to request his services."

During looting that broke out, Anderson Cooper got an injured child out of the middle of a fight: "Chaos in the wake of the earthquake in Haiti has repeatedly resulted in reporters on the ground getting emotionally and physically involved in helping the desperate. This time it is Anderson Cooper, who was there with the CNN crew covering the utter pandemonium in the streets, where innocent people were being injured, including one boy who was dragged and later carried to safety by Cooper. " I remember seeing the video--the kid was really bloody.

Watch it at the second source if you want to. These guys are both Persons of the Year.

He is a great choice. TIME's reason says it all, as you quote: ""for connecting more than half a billion people and mapping the social relations among them" and "for changing how we all live our lives. " Not many folks change the lives of hundreds of millions of people, even a little bit.

Now you could argue about which year he should have been person of the year; but, this is probably as good as any. For one thing, "On July 21, 2010, Zuckerberg reported that the company reached the 500 million-user mark. " He certainly earned being person of the year for one of the last few years as Facebook made its huge impact on society.

TIME usually picks politicians, whether or not they really deserve it. The last one like Zuckerberg was Jeffrey P. Bezos (the Amazon guy) in 1999, who also deserved the award.

Really, I can't think of anything. Not to be rude, but could it be that the folks at TIME magazine are so out of touch with technology that it took a movie ("The Social Network") to bring Facebook to their attention? In today's day and age, they should really open up online polls to make the final determination of the winner.

I started out thinking that this was a bad choice, for some of the reasons already stated by @Nichole_McBride Then I changed my mind. I don't like Zuckerberg. He looks smarmy and fearful.

If I was a god fearing person I'd say he has a one way ticket. He looks like he sleeps with demons :) TIME has given the cover to a few odd things in the past ( including The Computer and You ). Being ON the cover is not necessarily a 'reward'.

It is, as already stated, just an indication of the news generated by the recipient, for good or ill. And I say that Zuckerberg as a person deserves this 'reward' for being 'newsworthy ill' TIMES says "For connecting more than half a billion people and mapping the social relations among them, for creating a new system of exchanging information and for changing how we live our lives, Mark Elliot Zuckerberg is TIME's 2010 Person of the Year" Indeed, Facebook is driven by this man. Facebook would not be Facebook if it wasn't for Zuckerberg, just as Apple is Steve Jobs ( I do wonder if Steve Jobs is envious or thinking wtf?) I can see how the man has surpassed the software.

Remember the sweating interviews, remember the backtracking probes into personal data and privacy. See the source graphic for how Facebook 'privacy' has changed since 2005 and it's all because of Zuckerberg...I think that's why it's a one way ticket and I think all that news about privacy helped this result - it's not just about being connected, it's also HOW you are connected. Oh, and yes let's not forget the movie...sigh I'm sorry but there are no links added to this question concerning the movie The Social Network.

But again, it's newsworthy and thus adds to the ticks in the Zuckerberg column. Why not Julian Assange or Lady Gaga? Oh, I think they are both good choices and out of the two I'd choose Julian but I'm not the one calculating news per person per report per consequence etc that TIME do to put something on the cover of their end of year magazine.

Not a good choice, They could have chosen FACEBOOK itself. Or Juliane Asainge guy from wikileaks.

1938 = Adolf tler 2010 = Mark Zuckerberg ...Even a clock is right twice a day...

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.