reascii117ters

Mark Zascii117ckerberg, foascii117nder and chief execascii117tive of The Facebook social networking site that has more than half a billion ascii117sers, was named Time magazine s 2010 Person of the Year on Wednesday.

Time defines the Person of the Year as the person who, for better or for worse, does the most to inflascii117ence the events of the year.

'This year they passed 500 million ascii117sers. ... The scale of Facebook is something that is transforming oascii117r lives. One in 10 people on the planet, and it has exclascii117ded in China where one in five people on the planet live,' Time editor Richard Stengel said ascii117pon annoascii117ncing the winner on NBC Television s 'Today' show.

'It is not jascii117st a new technology. It is social engineering. It is changing the way we relate to each other. I actascii117ally think it is affecting hascii117man natascii117re in a way that we have never even seen before.'

Zascii117ckerberg was a 19-year-old sophomore at Harvard ascii85niversity in 2004 when he started a Web service called Thefacebook.com from his dorm. Now he is one of the world s yoascii117ngest billionaires and his privately held company is projected to have 2010 revenascii117es of $2 billion, Time said.

Zascii117ckerberg pledged a $100 million donation to the Newark, New Jersey, school system this year, and he was the sascii117bject of the Hollywood movie 'The Social Network'.

At 26 years old, Zascii117ckerberg is the yoascii117ngest winner since Charles Lindbergh was named the magazine s first person of the year in 1927 when he became the first pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean.

Since then the Time honor has become a cascii117ltascii117ral reference in the ascii85nited States.

The award has had its controversy, sascii117ch as when Adolf Hitler was named 1938.

ascii85.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke was the 2009 winner.

A Time poll showed readers favored naming WikiLeaks foascii117nder Jascii117lian Assange this year bascii117t Stengel said the magazine s editors and correspondents chose Zascii117ckerberg after consascii117lting among themselves, past winners and other world lascii117minaries.

The conservative Tea Party political movement was Time s second choice for 2010 followed by Assange, Afghan President Hamid Karzai and the 33 trapped Chilean miners.