TIME Readers Pick Wikileaks' Julian Assange as Person of the Year

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is TIME Magazine's Person of the Year for 2010.

/ SALVATORE DI NOLFI

The controversial founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, has won an online vote to be TIME Magazine's Person of the Year.

The annual online vote asks readers to choose the most influential person, people or things from the previous year.

Readers voted a total of 1,249,425 times, and the favorite was clear, TIME reported. Julian Assange raked in 382,020 votes, giving him an easy first place. He was 148,383 votes over the silver medalist, Recep Tayyip Ergodan, Prime Minister of Turkey.

The magazine's editorial choice of Person of the Year will be unveiled Wednesday.

Assange and WikiLeaks made first made headlines this year in April, when his organization released a video allegedly showing two Reuters employees being fired upon by the U.S. Military. In July, WikiLeaks released 92,000 documents related to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Assange's biggest splash came in November, when his organization began releasing the first of a reported 250,000 secret U.S. diplomatic cables.

Assange is currently sitting in a London jail awaiting further hearings on his possible extradition to Sweden to face sexual assault charges. Assange and his lawyers have dismissed the charges as politically motivated.

While Assange won Time's online poll, Lady Gaga won the Facebook poll time set up. The ubiquitous pop starlet received 65,417 "likes" on Facebook to Assange's 45,643.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke was the 2009 Time Person of the Year.

Online Poll: TIME Readers Vote on Top Ten People of the Year

1. Julian Assange

2. Recep Tayyip Ergodan

3. Lady Gaga

4. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert

5. Glenn Beck

6. Barack Obama

7. Steve Jobs

8. The Chilean Miners

9. The Unemployed American

10. Mark Zuckerberg

[sayit2]

Who is clueless?
If you are afraid to speak the truth you have ALREADY lost your freedom!

Assange did not embarass anyone.
His targets already embarassed themselves by their behaviour.

There is a huge difference between national security and secrecy maintained to cover corruption and lies.
Big Brother IS dirty. Read '1984!' The defence of freedom doesn't come cheap. Have you read any history?
Thank goodness for an articulate man with the courage of his ethical convictions.

Get it all out in the open.
Demand respect for DEMOCRATIC values.

Viva Assange!

[PageWriter]

I was heartened to hear that Time readers Online chose Julian Assange--not Mark Zukerberg as "Person of the Year."

I take a wide-angle view of this controversy--as I came-of-age during the Nixon Watergate scandal. If it hadn't been for the journalists who broke the Watergate scandal, history might have turned-out differently. Presidents, from then on, could be B-Movie Stars (Reagan), Peanut Farmers (Carter), the head of the CIA (Bush, Sr.) or the owner of a team (Bush, Jr.)
In other words, the dignity of the highest-office in America had been compromised, and being erudite was not valued (VP who misspelled 'potato')....
Also: the wars we fought, after Viet Nam were summarily censored. I was teaching at Nato Hdqtrs when Schwarzkoff censored the press. From there, it became the status quo.
Also: if the press wanted "access" they often compromised their news stories. As the NYT Editor-in-Chief said of Julian Assange, and news in general: 99% of the news we're given has little or no significance to our lives. (paraphrased).
It's interesting that Mark Zukerberg was voted "Man of the Year," by Time Magazine. As the BBC said, (and I paraphrase) who would vote for a man who sells your privacy as man of the year?
Julian Assange, as even Hillary Clinton attests to, and others as well, the Wiki-Leaks are not dangerous breaches of security, but just embarrassing. Now, perhaps to stave-off the upcoming "leaks" about Bank of America, it is cutting off Assange by refusing to process his donations.
What shall we make of Julian Assange? That if you take the brave step of releasing embarrassing leaks about governments, wars, and powerful corporations, that you can expect to have your reputation skewered, bogus charges and even Interpol to assail you even further?
I, for one, applaud the courage it takes to tell the truth. Just perhaps it will end a win-less war in Afghanistan, and call all politicians and governments to be accountable for their actions and policies.

[bundye]

How ignorant are some people?????

[jgg000101]

nobody reads time magazine anymore. They are bleeding subscriptions. This year newsweek sold for one dollar - the entire company for less than the cost of one magazine. Bye Time. Your time is up.

[PatriotMike3]

Time readers are ignorant morons who need specific directions to wipe their own arses. They are the ignorant filth that elected America's Nobel Prize winning schmuck.

[bradkt1]

A terrible choice. This arrogant man who thinks that he knows better than anyone else stands for nothing but himself. He masquerades as a champion of freedom.

[mokey22]

It must only be readers from Iran or our countries other enemies like liberals

[mokey22]

If time makes a person that attacks america a person of the year then they are traitors and I will never read one word of their magazine again and will encourage others to do the same.

[jgg000101]

hey, sollaray, it's been 10 freaken years. you and your commie buddies need to work harder.

[alphafactor]

I'm glad he won.
His victory means something very clear: we want greater freedom on the Internet.

[mokey22]

No victory for you yet. The internet is the worlds demise

[samXXkiley]

coucou,
Julian a fait parler de lui, normal qu'il soit en premi?re place.
il faut ?sperer que la justice ne sera pas injuste envers "julian assange", en l'accusant ? tort.

mark zuckerberg class? en bas de la liste, c'est bien fait!
?a lui servira de le?ons
****************************************************

Julian was talking about him, it is normal for first place.
Hopefully justice will not be unfair to "Julian Assange", accusing him falsely.

Mark Zuckerberg ranked at the bottom of the list, well done!
it will serve as lessons au revoir