Elon Musk was named Time Magazine Person of the Year

Time magazine named Elon Musk the 2021 Person of the Year.

Titles are awarded to the most influential person in the previous year and are not necessarily considered awards.

Musk wasn't the first auto industry executive to be named Person of the Year — Walter Chrysler and General Motors President Harlow Curtis were named in 1955, respectively.

Time magazine announced today that Elon Musk is the magazine's Person of the Year. Titles are not necessarily awards, but are given to people who have had a huge impact on the world and on journalism in the past year. Musk's important role as Tesla's head, his adventure into space travel with SpaceX, and his current status as the richest man in the world make him both a household name and a controversial figure in the automotive world and beyond.

This year, Tesla became a trillion-dollar company and continues to dominate the growing market for electric vehicles. Musk's SpaceX also ushered in a landmark year, launching its first space mission in September consisting of a crew of all. But the Times article points out not only Musk's business acumen, but also his outspoken personality, describing him as a "crazy hybrid of Thomas Edison, PT Barnum, Andrew Carnegie, and Watchmen's Dr. Manhattan." From his comical, snarky tweets — which may be close to internet trolling — to his Saturday night scene in May, Musk almost always manages to find a way into the daily news cycle.

The magazine also describes how Musk's prominence "coincides with broader trends in which he and his tech giants are both causal and causal." Time has shown that influential individuals have replaced traditional institutions, power has shifted from government to private companies, and the gap between the super-rich and other populations is widening. There's also space travel, formerly the domain of great powers, now being taken over by companies including Musk's SpaceX.