Mark Zuckerberg, the former Harvard University student who created the world’s most popular social networking site Facebook, has been selected as Time magazine’s Person of the Year for 2010. As we are all well aware, the founding of Facebook has been immortalized in one of the year’s best films, The Social Network (which was nominated for a Golden Globe award yesterday) … which, IMHO, took the booming website to a whole new level of public consciousness. In that context, it’s very easy to see how Time decided name Zuckerberg the 2010 Person of the Year:

Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been named Time’s “Person of the Year” for 2010, joining the ranks of winners that include heads of state and rock stars as the person the magazine believes most influenced events of the past year. At 26, Zuckerberg is the youngest “Person of the Year” since the first one chosen, Charles Lindbergh; he was 25 when he was named in 1927, Time said Wednesday. Zuckerberg beat out Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II by just two weeks: She was 26 when she was named in 1952. Incidentally, Queen Elizabeth II has recently joined Zuckerberg’s social networking behemoth. Time’s “Person of the Year” is the person or thing that has most influenced the culture and the news during the past year for good or for ill. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke received the honor last year. The 2008 winner was then-President-elect Barack Obama. The 2007 winner was Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Other previous winners have included Bono, President George W. Bush, and Amazon.com CEO and founder Jeff Bezos. In naming Zuckerberg, Time cited him “for changing how we all live our lives.”

It is really mind-boggling to think about how much Mark Zuckerberg has effected the way we interact in the Internet age. Millions and millions of people exchange personal information with one another every second of every day on Facebook. It is the single most popular website in the world … and it all started as a lark on one fated booze-infused night at Harvard University. It’s just … insane. After the jump, check out a few photos of Zuckerberg from this Person of the Year issue of Time and read more about how he was selected and what he thinks of the honor …

Zuckerberg has put himself on the map not only as one of the world’s youngest billionaires, but also as a prominent newcomer to the world of philanthropy. Earlier this year, he pledged $100 million over five years to the Newark, N.J. school system. Now, he’s in the company of media titans Carl Icahn Barry Diller and others who have joined Giving Pledge, an effort led by Microsoft founder Bill Gates and investor Warren Buffett to commit the country’s wealthiest people to step up their charitable donations. Zuckerberg owns about a quarter of Facebook’s shares. Zuckerberg has built Facebook into an international phenomenon by stretching the lines of social convention and embracing a new and far more permeable definition of community. In this new world, users are able to construct a social network well beyond what would ever be possible face-to-face. “I’m trying to make the world a more open place,” Zuckerberg says in the “bio” line of his own Facebook page. Born in Zuckerberg’s Harvard dorm room, the site has in six years grown to more than 500 million users worldwide and a dollar worth in the billions … In a posting on his Facebook page, Zuckerberg said Wednesday that being named Time’s “Person of the Year” was “a real honor 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. I’m happy to be a part of that.”

Click HERE to read the online version of Time‘s coverstory article on Zuckerberg to get the full scoop. What do y’all think of Time‘s Person of the Year selection this year? Did they get it right? Do YOU agree that Mark Zuckerberg is the Person of the Year for 2010? If not, who do you think should’ve received the honor?

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