Our Person of the Year

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December 4, 2011

By Steven Greer, MD

Our selection for Person of the Year won’t surprise you, but our runner up might. The question used for selecting the Person of the Year was, “Who will people, ten years from now, remember the most from 2011?”

Osama bin Laden was killed, but 2011 was not the year of OBL. That was really 2001.

Muammar Qaddafi (or numerous other spellings have been used) was a consideration. He personified the Arab Spring.

Penn State coaches Joe Paterno and Jerry Sandusky were candidates, as was Rep. Anthony Weiner. But the two biggest names of the year, in our opinion, were Steve Jobs and Charlie Sheen.

We almost selected Charlie Sheen because his mental breakdown, subsequent firing from the CBS #1 show Two and a Half Men, and comedy tour, became a true phenomenon. He developed millions of Twitter followers faster than anyone before, and proved that “new media”, via his Ustream home broadcasts, had finally arrived. TV executives took notice.

Our selection for Person of the Year, however, is Apple founder Steve Jobs. His death was the most memorable event of the year related to any single person. Jobs died at the peak of his career, at a time when his devices like the iPad were still transforming society.

After his death, the summaries of his life made people remember that he was not just a guy who got rich off of one big idea. He did it over and over with Apple, then Pixar, then Apple again. He transformed the music and movie industries. He did not live to see it, but he put in place the ability for Apple to soon transform the home entertainment system when Apple makes a large screen TV with a computer inside.