Taking a closer glance at Time Magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people of 2022, I believe that social media culture plays a huge role in one’s level of “influence” on the public.  

The list is divided into various categories, including artists, innovators, titans, leaders, icons and pioneers. Seeing this compilation of individuals led me to contemplate what truly makes someone “influential.” While the term often has a positive connotation, it is objectively defined as “having great influence on something or someone” (Oxford Language). I only recognized a handful of names on the list, the majority of which fell into the “artist” category. Maybe I am uncultured and not as knowledgeable about global affairs as I should be, or perhaps the internet is partially to blame. Though they were of course separated into different categories, it was shocking to see artists like Mila Kunis and Pete Davidson alongside world leaders like Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin. My initial reaction was that someone like Vladimir Putin is undoubtedly more influential than someone like Mila Kunis. As I thought more about it, however, I started to question whether this is necessarily true. Though world leaders are obviously more “influential” in terms of their ability to impact foreign policy and global affairs, actors and internet figures sometimes feel more influential in a day-to-day sense. We interact with and have “access” to these celebrities at all times, and this sheer access inevitably gives them more influence on our lives. The mediums connecting us to political figures like Joe Biden are extremely distant and indirect – information originates at the government level, is articulated in carefully planned press releases and is then disseminated to the public through news channels. This tedious process is far different from our interaction with celebrities like Amanda Seyfreid, who we can communicate with somewhat directly via social media. I anticipate that in the future, a broader category will need to be created to include “internet celebrities.”

I also found it interesting that the list was “exclusively chosen by Time editors” with nominations from Time 100 alumni and international writing staff. I find it odd that this list is compiled only by staff members affiliated with Time, as this likely leads to some degree of bias. Who is making these decisions? Is there any objective way to measure “influence” quantitatively? Influence clearly can’t be determined based on a “follower count,” since many of these individuals aren’t active social media users. I wonder if there is another, less subjective, way to evaluate this concept.