They almost selected Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad but eventually came to settle on you. Good choice:
And we didn’t just watch, we also worked. Like crazy. We made Facebook profiles and Second Life avatars and reviewed books at Amazon and recorded podcasts. We blogged about our candidates losing and wrote songs about getting dumped. We camcordered bombing runs and built open-source software.
America loves its solitary geniuses—its Einsteins, its Edisons, its Jobses—but those lonely dreamers may have to learn to play with others. Car companies are running open design contests. Reuters is carrying blog postings alongside its regular news feed. Microsoft is working overtime to fend off user-created Linux. We’re looking at an explosion of productivity and innovation, and it’s just getting started, as millions of minds that would otherwise have drowned in obscurity get backhauled into the global intellectual economy.
Who are these people? Seriously, who actually sits down after a long day at work and says, I’m not going to watch Lost tonight. I’m going to turn on my computer and make a movie starring my pet iguana? I’m going to mash up 50 Cent’s vocals with Queen’s instrumentals? I’m going to blog about my state of mind or the state of the nation or the steak-frites at the new bistro down the street? Who has that time and that energy and that passion?
I guess that would be me. I’ve never seen Lost. Not a single minute of it. I feel like I have though. People at work spend hours talking about it.
The question is, what about the people not taking part in creating/using any of this user-generated-content? Are they part of the ‘You’? – Hyku
No, I think those are the folks watching Lost.
Mashable: You could argue that Time is overdoing the YouTube fawning: they’ve already named the video site Time’s Invention of the Year, despite not really being an invention. That said, the list of nominees doesn’t deliver any obvious winners: George W. Bush, Pope Benedict XVI, Dick Cheney, Jack Abramoff, Bill Ford and Stephen Colbert are among them (I would have voted for Colbert). What’s more, it makes for a positive story at a time when the conflict in Iraq dominates the headlines.
MyDD: I predicted that the American people, particularly the voters should get it, so, I guess I was on to something. Congratulations America, whoever YOU are.
Tammy Bruce: That’s right. It’s everyone, courtesy of the internet, blogs, YouTube, and every other internet mechanism that has allowed the regular person’s voice to be heard. Funny enough, of course, we’ve always had a voice, but now because it can’t be ignored, we get to be Time’s “Person of the Year.”
Urban Grounds: ’ll be adding TIME’s Person of the Year to my resume first thing Monday morning. For an autographed cover, please use the Contact page to send me your name and mailing address, and use the Pay Pal donate button to send $6.50 to cover the cost of a magazine, shipping, and packaging.
The Mike Power Effect: Thank you for giving “me” the honor of being Time Magazine’s Person of the Year. While I’m jamming to music on Winamp radio streams, I am writing away, ranting on and on about stuff that ticks me off. Also, I’m linking to the best viral video created by you! Yes, “you” are also Time’s Person of the Year. Without the rest of “You,” I wouldn’t have anything to link to. Without “you,” there wouldn’t be anything to talk about.
Blog-o-Fascists: I feel a cosmic sense of oneness. Satori. The moment of Buddhistic enlightenment. The dervish in his trance. Om mani padme hummmmm. At least we beat out Ahmadinejad.
Instapundit: It’s a recognition of a phenomenon that some of us have been talking about for a while.
Angry Baby Monkey: That’s the last time I read a Time magazine while I am waiting in the doctor’s office to have something unsightly burned off of my privates!
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