Time's Person of the Year: You (Us)

[Grand Inquisitor]

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/12/16/time.you.tm/index.html

Given that this is the first online community I was aware of being a part of, I wondered what people thought about this.

I'm interested both in what people think about the possible emergence of a non-state community and peoples' opinions about TMD and what they've observed here (good and bad).

[Klep]

I think the choice is excellent.  This is the first year that the power of the internet to allow people to really communicate with each other and influence world events has really shown itself. Between blogs, youtube, and other social networking sites, the increasing net penetration has allowed the common man to access a truly massive audience.

An example of the influence the common man has had this year can readily be seen in the outcome of the US elections, a process long-determined largely by who had the biggest pocketbooks behind them. A well-entrenched US senator lost his primary, which defined the national message for the Democratic party and highly energized the base.  A man bereft of party support in California's 11th district and a woman similarly left on her own in New Hampshire's 1st both won their elections on the backs of bloggers and local activists.  Hell, the very control of the US Senate was determined by some random guy catching an incumbent senator calling him "macaca" on video and putting it online.

[The Atog Lord]

Well, I guess it's time to add "Time Magazine Person of the Year, 2006" to my resume.

[Komatteru]

I was going to vote for myself anyway.

[Matt]

This is not the first or even second online community I've been a part of. I highly approve of Time's choice and in fact I am going out on a limb and saying that You People will also be the Person of the Century.

Some months ago, in another thread, on another board, we were discussing counterculture and I realized that a person's subculture or counterculture used to be defined by music for several decades, it no longer is, and now it's defined by what websites you visit.

Take for example this board. Mostly the people here like heavy metal, but there's plenty of Magic players that usually won't listen to it. Veggies likes his J-pop, there's plenty whose favorite music is straightforward rock, or classical, or whatever. Old archetypes based on music like "stoner" and "metalhead" are not good predictors of a subculture now, if they ever were. However, "TMDer" or "SA goon" seems to (there is bound to be some overlap).

What this meant in the context of the conversation was that we shouldn't expect rock music to be "saved" because music for the forseeable future will simply not be important or relevant in the way that the musical movements of the latter half the 20th century were (beat, hippie, punk, metal, grunge, hiphop). The prevailing predictor of subcultures seem to come in 45-60 year shifts - in the early 20th century, youth subculture was defined by political and social views (such as communist groups, anti-communist groups, progressive bohemia, etc.). Then it was music, now it's websites.

[Bram]

I couldn't agree more with what the article (and Matt!) said. I'd even take it a step further and state that it should the PRIME focus for sociological research in the next decade.

[ELD]

Nothing brightens your day like finding out you're getting an award that was also given to Hitler.  Congrats to all the Moderators.  Your draconian ways have really gotten some attention. 

[Bram]

Nothing brightens your day like finding out you're getting an award that was also given to Hitler.

That was person of the year? I thought is was "Worst Haircut In History".

[BigMac]

I'd even take it a step further and state that it should the PRIME focus for sociological research in the next decade.

You planning on using this in your thesis Bram???

[LotusHead]

http://www.youtube.com/profile?user=TeamVacaville

What have YOU done to be Person of the Year?

I myself have realized how utterly cool and empowering the InterNet/InformationHighway/FreeStuff stuff has been.

I have made Video's of bands that have zero national exposure, artists that have almost zero global marketability and have known of news scoops a least moments before Fox News gave it to me.  (I am Uber Liberal, but I watch Fox News.  They
aren't boring and they do, ocassionally, ask tough questions.

DAISY SPOT!

(that's the band I filmed as a You Tube Dude!)

[Bram]

What have I done to earn it? I'll tell you what I did.

I have, through hard work and personal sacrifice, at the expense of building a viable academic career and sustaining a meaningful romantic relationship, labored to keep a community of 5,000+ Magic: the Gathering geeks together by hijacking threads, confirming American prejudices against the Dutch, pestering you with lame photoshops, cruel & unusual moderation tactics and generally acting like a random idiot.

Thanks for the recognition, Time!

[Klep]

I voted.

[Anusien]

Two words: Cop.  Out.

The Daily Show on this was hilarious.

[Klep]

Two words: Cop.  Out.

The Daily Show on this was hilarious.

No, as JP mentioned to me when we were talking about this, the REAL cop-out was when Rudy Guiliani got it in 2001 so they wouldn't have to give it to Osama Bin Laden. THAT was a cop-out.

[Matt]

I don't know where else to put this so here it is:

http://www.devilducky.com/media/46386/

[sean1i0]

Holy crap, that lyrebird is awesome!

[MaxxMatt]

Google mantain more than 50% of the *total* information on Net.
Other society ( aside with the latter ) gave us perfect tools into which we, poor men, would find some sort of new interaction and funny.
We are mutually animating that *entire circus* for us.

Internet has been an empty box for a while, then someone jeopardize it giving the *direction of the entire machine* to people.
They give free and decisive contribute because of the *communitary intents* and *liberal surrounding* Internet claims to be.
Anyone around here is part of this wheel and can state of being of some help into some projects.

Blogs, Wikipedia, Scheduling, Forums, Free Entertainement Tools, GoogleProjects are misleading words.
You think about them as *YOUR* way to interact with the world and with other people.
They gave you a scepter and a crown, realizing that *YOU* contribute to *THEIR* world for free.

Time is passing, money are increasing, values are rising up to the sky.
With our funny alone, someone would *freely*  obtain the most horrible scepter of our era: our informations and our work.

They gave us a scepter and a crown to pump our ego: incidentally the same mechanism is going to hide and protect the real master of puppets.


Don't be harsh with me, I'm only foresighting.
The most appropriate statement would have been: *Time Magazine Puppets of the Year 2006: You*

Welcome to their modern world.
All the past emperors have been less wiser than this last one...

Massimo

[Bram]

They gave you a scepter and a crown, realizing that *YOU* contribute to *THEIR* world for free.

I don't buy that for a second. Or rarther: I buy it, but it's only half of the story. Sure, web 2.0 ensures that users unwittingly make money for others. But it's not just a conspiracy that constrains our actions. It's an enabling technology, too. Regardless of who makes money off my (and anyone else's) contributions to the multiplicity of the Internet, it DOES enable communication between PEOPLE (rather that, say, politicians and businessmen) the world over. And it DOES enable access to information. People still have agency in all this - the 'script' embedded in the technology may be somewhat ominous (asyou seem to suggest), but that doesn't mean I - and you - have to 'read' it that way. Emancipatory technologies4L!

[jpmeyer]

Two words: Cop.  Out.

The Daily Show on this was hilarious.

No, as JP mentioned to me when we were talking about this, the REAL cop-out was when Rudy Guiliani got it in 2001 so they wouldn't have to give it to Osama Bin Laden. THAT was a cop-out.

Now that I think about it, it is a cop out if you believe that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should have won.

[kirdape3]

Nasrallah?  There are a bunch that were awfully influential, but Ahmadinejad was heavily damaged by elections right at the end of the year.  I could easily see Hugo Chavez as well.

[Demonic Attorney]

Congrats to all the Moderators.  Your draconian ways have really gotten some attention.

Frankly, I'm disappointed that I wasn't interviewed as part of the column.