Moot tops Time World’s Most Influential People List

Overtaking the likes of American President Barack Obama and Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama,  Christopher Poole aka Moot, has topped Time’s World’s Most Influential People List.
“The founder of the online community 4chan.org, whose real name is Christopher Poole, received 16,794,368 votes and an average influence rating of 90 (out of a
possible 100) to handily win the third annual Time 100 poll,” Time said.

“Moot is no less deserving than previous title holders like Nintendo video-game designer Shigeru Miyamoto (2007) and Korean pop star Rain (2006),” said Time.com managing editor Josh Tyrangiel talking about the worthiness of Moot’s No 1 position.

Time has said that since Moot launched 4chan.org in 2003, the site has given birth to Internet memes  like Lolcats and Rickrolling.

“4chan.org gets 13 million page views a day and 5.6 million visitors a month; by some estimates it is the second largest bulletin board in the world,” the magazine said.

4chan’s Alexa ranking is about 1000. Wall Street Journal revealed Christopher Poole’s identity on July 9, 2008.

Then, Time had carried a story on Moot being Christopher Poole, but it later ran a story saying that there was a chance that there Christopher Poole was not Moot, but a 4chan inside joke.

In the second position, after Christopher Poole, in Time’s World’s Most Influential List, is Malaysian politician Anwar Ibrahim.

The third most influential person in the world is evangelist Rick Warren, followed by Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud in the fourth position, and Google’s Larry Brilliant in the fifth position.

Barack Obama is placed at 37 while Dalai Lama stands at 61.

Three Indians who feature in the list are Congress party leader Sonia Gandhi at 62, UTV’s Ronnie Screwvala in the 70th position, and Tata Motors’ Ratan Tata at 90.

“The Italian-born head of India’s most influential political party is beloved by her constituents, not only because of her family history but also because of her efforts
to combat poverty.”

However, “she has been bogged down by a public spat with one of her rivals,” Time said about Sonia Gandhi.

Other Indians making the extended list of 203 World’s Most Influential People are Mukesh Ambani at 146, Pepsico CEO Indra Nooyi at 165, and management consultant Ram Charan at 169.

Also making the list are Infosys co-founder Nandan Nilekani, music director AR Rahman, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Oprah Winfrey, and Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos.