Zuckerberg - 2nd Draft

From nomination to selection, designating someone as a special person of the year is often a very subjective and controversial process. Barack Obama, the president of USA, received Nobel Peace Prize in 2009, and the decision of Nobel Prize committee casued an enormous dispute as to whether a newly elected president of US deserved to get this most prestigious award. Similarly, Kathyrin Bigelow was named 'filmmaker of the year' at the 2010 Oscars, instead of James Cameron, who created the revolutionary 3D blockbuster 'Avatar'. With these examples in mind, we can see that designating 'the person of the year by TIME Magazine'  is equally subjective, and thus, very controversial. This year, Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, was selected for 'the person of the year', by winning over the closest competitor Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks. Of course, TIME magazine's decision also aroused controversy.

The first reason of why Mark Zuckerberg received 'the person of the year 2010' is that he was extremely influential. No one denies his invention and creation has brought us tremendous change; Facebook, armed with its convenience and speed, now replaces other social network services. It facilitates fast communication and exchange of ideas among people, and enables users to search and strengthen their social relationship. What's more, Facebook provides a variety of applications and functions so that people can freely enjoy it. It led to a drastic expansion of social network services and altered the map of the global IT market. He was indeed an influential person.
           But the 'significance of influence' must not be the only factor that decides the winner. What we have to question is whether the influence is positive or negative; this is perhaps why some people disagree with TIME magazine's decision this year. Of course, in the history, there have been a few examples of negatively influential nominees. Adolph Hitler, the German dictator, actually commenced World War II and killed millions of innocent people. Despite this, he was designated the person of the year in 1938. Joseph Stalin, the tyrannical Soviet ruler, was even nominated twice, in both 1939 and 1942. Everyone can agree that they were influential, but not many people will answer they were influential in positive ways. Similarly, those who disagree with Zuckerberg's case insist his invention, Facebook, is bringing uncontrolled side effects. They say Facebook infringes upon individual's privacy, attracts Internet users with its addictiveness, and creates further security problems. On the other hand, Zuckerberg’s supporters say Facebook has been, and will continue to be, influential in positive ways.

I personally believe Zuckerberg deserves to get the person of the year for 2010. He was obviously the most influential person this year - which fulfills the first prerequisite: 'the significance of influence'. Moreover, I think his influence was quite beneficial to people as well. Now I can easily connect with my old friends even though I'm living in the dormitory boarding school. Many of my friends, seniors and teachers in KMLA can have free, fast and convenient communication, which they couldn't have through other social network services such as Cyworld, MSN Messenger, and Twitter. Of course, I think there are some problems such as privacy matters or addiction. Yet these problems can be fixed through system updates and preventing excessive use. I believe the harms do not outweigh the benefits. The positive influences are more significant than the negative ones.

Considering that another candidate of 'the person of 2010' was Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, I firmly think Mark Zuckerberg deserves to get it more than Assange does. Some people say Assange is worthier than Zuckerberg, because Zuckerberg actually sells private information to corporations and gains profit from it while Assange frees secret information to the public without any financial gain. Despite this lack of monetary motivation, we cannot say that his work is good or bad. In fact, giving off classified and confidential military secrets to the public through Wikileaks does more harm than good, because he's playing with individuals' lives and societal security against governments. For example, Julian Assange has said that his next target is to 'attack' the Wall Street bank system. What a dangerous thought!
             Now here come two decisive questions: Which is more beneficial to people? 'Convenient and enhanced social connection' or 'Classified government secrets being revealed'? Which is more harmful to them? 'Weak privacy policies that can be fixed later' or 'Endangering national security that cannot be reversed later'? I strongly argue that Zuckerberg is a more positively influential person - he deserves to get 'the person of the year’ for 2010.