Musk named Time magazine person of the year

Time magazine on Monday named Tesla chief and space entrepreneur Elon Musk as its person of the year, citing his embodiment of the technological shifts but also troubling trends reshaping people's lives.

Musk -- who overtook Amazon founder Jeff Bezos this year to become the world's wealthiest person -- wields impact on Earth with his Tesla electric car company and beyond our planet with his SpaceX rockets. 

"Musk's rise coincides with broader trends of which he and his fellow technology magnates are part cause and part effect," Time editor-in-chief Edward Felsenthal wrote.

Among those trends, Felsenthal listed "the continuing decline of traditional institutions in favor of individuals; government dysfunction that has delivered more power and responsibility to business and chasms of wealth and opportunity."

Time editors have previously defined the title -- which last year went to President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris -- as going to people who "embodied what was important about the year, for better or for worse." 

In October, Musk's electric car company's valuation soared above a trillion dollars, and SpaceX has teamed up with US space agency NASA to launch various missions including a test run of protecting Earth from an asteroid.

The brash South African-born 50-year-old has seen his wealth soar during the pandemic to over $250 billion, according to Forbes' real-time billionaires list. 

He has also courted controversy with his provocative Twitter feed that can attack, joke and provoke -- including a poll in November asking Twitter whether he should sell a 10 percent share of his Tesla stock.

- 'Wealthy, mostly white men' -

Felsenthal noted Musk's provocative vision is accompanied by a persona which is a "blunt instrument that often seems to revel in division and aggressive mockery as he gives the world access to his id through social media."

Musk has appeared ever-present in American culture in recent years, amassing 66 million Twitter followers and guest-hosting the famed late-night comedy show Saturday Night Live in May. 

Musk speaks ambitiously about his interest in colonizing Mars, and plans orbital flights next year as part of SpaceX's planned American return to the Moon.

"The goal overall has been to make life multi-planetary and enable humanity to become a spacefaring civilization," Musk told Time in an interview released with the Person of the Year announcement.

He has also been known to move markets and the value of cryptocurrencies with a single tweet, but his main terrestrial influence for now is with his electric vehicles.

"Our intent with Tesla was always that we would serve as an example to the car industry, and hope that they also make electric cars so that we can accelerate the transition to sustainable energy," Musk told Time.

Time notes that in an earlier era interplanetary travel was a collective undertaking that leaders used to rally their nations, but that increasingly private companies are involved. 

"To Musk, that is progress, steering capital allocation away from the government to those who will be good stewards of it," Felsenthal wrote. 

"To others, it is testament to capitalism's failings as staggeringly wealthy, mostly white men play by their own rules while much of society gets left behind," he added.

Agence France-Presse

Maria Ressa is second Filipino named Time Magazine’s Person of the Year

Rappler CEO Maria Ressa is the second Filipino to be part of the prestigious “Person of the Year” roster of Time magazine after late President Cory Aquino in 1986.

Ressa, who is facing several tax evasion charges, joins the late Jamal Khashoggi, detained Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe and the Capital Gazette, a small newspaper, in Time’s list of “The Guardians.”

The group of journalists appear in four variant covers of the magazine.

Her inclusion came days after she posted bail of P204,000 for four of the five tax cases the government filed against her in 2018.

Filipino women named as “Person of the Year”

Time described Ressa and Rappler, the news website she helped establish in 2012, as fearless in their reporting of President Rodrigo Duterte’s propaganda machine on social media.

“While the Philippine government denies a political motivation for the charges against Ressa and Rappler, the news site she founded in 2012, international observers regard them as the latest salvo in President Rodrigo Duterte’s bid to muzzle critical press and silence criticism of his administration’s deadly war on drugs,” said Joseph Hincks.

Ressa told Time that being a journalist during Duterte’s presidency is more difficult than her work as a war zone correspondent before.

“I’ve been a war zone correspondent. I’ve planned coverage when one side is shooting against the other side. That is easy compared to what we’re dealing with now,” she said.

Her supporters use the hashtag #Holdtheline as they lauded her for the recognition.

This was her statement on the possibility of getting arrested upon her arrival in Manila on December 2. She went to the United States to receive the international Press Freedom Award given to her by the Committee to Protect Journalists.

The veteran reporter had been indicted over three counts of violating Section 255 of the Tax Code for failing to provide the correct information on her Income Tax Return for 2015, Value Added Tax returns for the third and fourth quarters of that year.

Corazon Aquino

Back in 1986, Aquino, the wife of late Senator Ninoy Aquino, held many “first’s.” She was hailed as the first female president of the country and the first Filipino to be the Woman of the Year.

“Whatever else happens in her rule, Aquino has already given her country a bright, and inviolate, memory. More important, she has also resuscitated its sense of identity and pride,” said Time.

Aquino that time said that being given with such recognition is an achievement of the Filipino people.

“I don’t want to say that this is my achievement. It is the Filipino people together who were able to believe in themselves because of what they were able to do in the election and then in the revolution. Because of this belief in each other they were now also able to look up to their leaders and follow their leaders,” she said.

She succeeded late Dictator Ferdinand Marcos as the leader of the country after he and his family were exiled to Hawaii,

Her son Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III became president in 2016.

The Guardians and the War on Truth

Edward Felsenthal, Time’s editor-in-chief, explained that his team decided to feature journalists this year because of their bravery in surpassing risks just to tell impactful stories.

“This year we are recognizing four journalists and one news organization who have paid a terrible price to seize the challenge of this moment: Jamal Khashoggi, Maria Ressa, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, and the Capital Gazette of Annapolis, Md.,” Felsenthal’s  statement read.

“They are representatives of a broader fight by countless others around the world—as of Dec. 10, at least 52 journalists have been murdered in 2018—who risk all to tell the story of our time,” he added.

Jamal Khashoggi, a prominent Saudi journalist who was a known critic of the Saudi government, was murdered after entering his country’s Istanbul consulate for divorce documents.

Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, Reuters journalists from Bangladesh, were detained in their home country for documenting the deaths of 10 Rohingya Muslims.

Five members of the Capital Gazette or the Capital, the local paper in the city of Annapolis in the state of Maryland, were gunned down inside their newsroom last June 28.

source: interaksyon.com

Ryan Reynolds, Oprah Winfrey top TIME 100 poll

MANILA, Philippines — Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte might have won the TIME 100 poll among politicians, but among entertainment industry personalities, actor Ryan Reynolds and actress-TV host Oprah Winfrey are at the top of the list.

Although mentioned first in the list, Reynolds and Winfrey, however, are not the only ones who got two percent of the votes. Also garnering two percent are other Hollywood celebrities Lady Gaga, Beyonce, J.K. Rowling, Emma Watson, James Corden, Viola Davis, Emma Stone, John Legend and Rihanna.


At close one percent are Kanye West, Melissa McCarthy, RuPaul, Kim Kardashian West and Drake.

Though given a zero percent rating, Selena Gomez, Fan Bingbing, Alec Baldwin, Ryan Gosling, Ashley Graham, Gigi Hadid, Jennifer Lopez, Katy Perry, DJ Khaled and Demi Lovato are also on the roster.

The TIME 100 is the US-based magazine’s annual list of the most influential people in the world. It features a number of leading artists, politicians, lawmakers, scientists, and leaders in technology and business. Although TIME's editors will choose the final list of honorees, readers can share their choices with as well through an online poll.

Voting closed at 11:59 p.m. on April 16, and the winner of the reader poll was announced immediately after. This year's official TIME 100 list will be revealed on April 20.

source: philstar.com

Obama is - once again - TIME's 'Person of the Year'

NEW YORK - Time magazine on Wednesday named the recently re-elected US President Barack Obama as its person of the year for 2012 -- the second time it has accorded him this honor.

Obama now not only has a reelection as America's first black president and a Nobel peace prize under his belt, but he beat fancied runners-up, including brave Pakistani girls' rights activist Malala Yousafzai, to be enshrined again as Time's dominant personality of the year.

The venerable American news magazine put Obama on its cover, striking a thoughtful, statuesque pose, and said he deserved the accolade as "the symbol and in some ways the architect of this new America."

The magazine lauded Obama's campaigning prowess, noting he was the first president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt to win more than 50 percent of the vote in two straight elections and the first president since 1940 to be re-elected despite a jobless rate above 7.5 percent.

Obama beat Republican Mitt Romney soundly in November's election to win a second four-year term, despite presiding over a chronic economic slump.

"In 2012, he found and forged a new majority, turned weakness into opportunity and sought, amid great adversity, to create a more perfect union," said Time, which had named Obama person of the year back in 2008 when he became America's first black president.

The others considered for the weekly magazine's traditional annual honor were Apple CEO Tim Cook, atomic scientist Fabiola Gianotti, and Egypt's post-revolutionary President Mohamed Morsi.

But Obama swept to the head of the pack because of what Time said was his ability to grasp the demographic and social changes shifting the United States.

"The truth is," Obama told Time, "that we have steadily become a more diverse and tolerant country that embraces people's differences and respects people who are not like us. That's a profoundly good thing. That's one of the strengths of America."

source: interaksyon.com

Knicks guard Jeremy Lin named to Time’s 100 Most Influential list

New York Knicks point guard Jeremy Lin, who captured the world’s imagination earlier this season with his Cinderella run for the struggling NBA team, has been named by Time Magazine as one of the 100 Most Influential People in the World.

Lin, an Asian-American product of Harvard University, overcame long odds to become a cult hero for fans of the struggling Knicks. United Stated education secretary Arne Duncan, a fellow Harvard alumnus and also a former Crimson basketball player, wrote Lin’s profile for Time.

“He’s dispelled the idea that Asian-American guards somehow couldn’t hack it in the NBA,” Duncan said, “and that being a world-class athlete on the court is somehow at odds with being an excellent student off the court.”

Left undrafted by NBA teams last season, Lin was signed to a two-year deal by the Golden State Warriors after an impressive performance in summer camp. But he was unable to get any significant playing time with the Warriors, and was cut twice in his second season — first by Golden State and then by the Houston Rockets — before being picked up by the Knicks.

Lin was on the verge of being cut by the Knicks when former coach Mike D’Antoni took a flyer on the untested guard, and he responded by stringing along several memorable performances, leading the team to wins without stars Carmelo Anthony and Amare Stoudemire.

But Lin’s amazing year was cut abruptly after he suffered a knee injury. He underwent surgery in April for a lateral meniscus tear, which rendered him out for the season.

source: interaksyon.com