TIME's Person Of the Year. How Clever.

TIME's Person of the Year.

I don’t know if it’s because I’m in the internet business I was amazed at this year’s Time’s Person of the Year. It simply reads: YOU. Yes, You.

My jaw dropped as I thought it was so clever, so spot-on, so timely, given the way the communication landscape is changing around us. My less internet-inclined friends took a while to digest and get it; asking me “You mean, ‘me’?” I got some power-hungry friends out there indeed.

And so yes, I applaud Time for being not only so clever but also so self-aware. Newspapers and magazines have been hit by sharply declining readership numbers. Why? Because people simply spend more time on other media, internet being one big contributor. And here is one magazine admitting and surrendering the power to US.

Yes, us.

WE have been making content, distributing it around the web, consuming it, re-editing it, coping, claiming, porting from device to device, spending hours doing it. Be it via blogs, wikis, forums, joining online communities (Friendster, MySpace, Facebook, Linkedin, whatever). Our friends get married to people they met on the other side of the globe through online communities (Match.com anyone?). The internet has become our oxygen.

My friends in PR tell me that may not have jobs 5 years from now. Newspapers invite regular bloggers to become a visible voice alongside their articles. When I search for ideas what to do in Sri Lanka I want to see other people’s blogs to get a first-hand experience. So I use blogger search (technokrati) to get a dose. I give up on search engines, as they send to show me too much commercial crap – I want a dose of other people’s experiences, the real stories.

When YouTube got bought over by Google, a pimply boy on CNN said he spends 2-3 hrs on YouTube every day and gets the stuff he wants. It then hit me – if he does that, it means he watches less TV, less MTV, this means MTV is cracking their heads now how to get back the kids. Could it be that Google is going to effectively become a TV channel and replace MTV thru its YouTube buy-up? Maybe the 1.65bln isn’t that ridiculous after all. Would it be that 5 years from now MTV will become yester-brand and YouTube will give us a fix with Pimp My Pod episodes?

6 months ago my friend Sarah Wormwell, the Aussie fashionista, now bidtorrent-queen and my brain-picker, told me how Prada reserved x seats at their Summer Collection runway for Fashion Bloggers, alongside the managing editors of the likes of Vogue etc. Prada recognized the power fashion bloggers have on us, the voice they represent amongst the fashion-crazy crowds. I was fascinated and inspired by this, but at that time could not find a fit with any of the brands I was working on.

That has changed now.

And I love it. I work fucking 12-14 hours a day sometimes and I still get the kicks. We work with great brands today who understand that putting money to TV, radio and roadshows aint gonna get them far. So yes, they “do the internet” now, but on different terms now too – we now work with consumers as our journalists, evangelists, brand ambassadors. Stay tuned for more and more there shall be!

It’s been YOUR year, so if you do not know why, this is your 101 to getting up-to-speed for 2007: get your own blog started, join a sport yahoo group to know the next hike date, date on match.com, find long-lost friends on Facebook, connect with Reena on Friendster, add me to your RSS reader, and voila – you are ready for 2007.