Mark Zuckerberg (Photo courtesy Facebook.com)

Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg is Time magazine’s 2010 Person of the Year.

Zuckerberg, 26, was chosen “for connecting more than half a billion people, … for creating a new system of exchanging information and for changing how we all live our lives,” the magazine said.

“Being named as Time Person of the Year is a real honour and recognition of how our little team is building something that hundreds of millions of people want to use to make the world more open and connected,” Zuckerberg wrote on his Facebook wall.

Facebook passed 500 million active users in July, six years after Zuckerberg, Dustin Moskovitz, Chris Hughes and Eduardo Saverin launched the social networking site from their dorm at Harvard University in February 2004.

The Social Network, the critically acclaimed drama about the birth of Facebook, has grossed nearly US$190 million worldwide since hitting theatres Oct. 1, according to Box Office Mojo.

Zuckerberg is among the youngest members in the Time Person of the Year club. Queen Elizabeth II, like Zuckerberg, was 26 years old when she was chosen in 1952. Aviator Charles Lindbergh was 25 when he became Time’s first Person of the Year in 1927.

(Photo courtesy Facebook.com)

Byline: Philip Alves
My Media Biz
Online: December 15, 2010 [www.mymediabiz.com]