Anyone who reads this is going to think that I am insane. I probably am. My person of the year is not a Nobel Prize winner, not a hardworking politician or a Goodwill Ambassador. My person of the year is the CEO of the Seattle based Web startup company Pet Holdings, Inc. They own such sites as “I Can Has Cheezburger?” and “FAIL Blog.” And there it is – you think I’m crazy. What’s worse is that I don’t know where to start defending my opinion. Should I give you his bio, explain what the heck “I Can Has Cheezburger?” really is, or should I just tell you to read the Related Links?

I guess I’ll start with the most ubiquitous aspect of my nomination, which is the “I Can Has Cheezburger?” site. It’s simply a site on which people post pictures of their cats accompanied by funny captions, the first of which had, you guessed it: “I can has Cheezburger?” as the caption. Ben Huh did not start the site, but in a very wise move he bought it from the founders in 2007. Why does this matter? Because above all, I respect someone who can go out on a limb. I really enjoy it when people do things that seem illogical to everyone else and end up with the last laugh.

Laughs are, in fact, what Ben Huh’s life is all about. He has been able to accomplish, by way of giving the public simple smiles, what very few sites can – profitability. Confounding all sorts of naysayers and experts Huh’s sites/businesses have not spent a single accounting year in the red. He has a knack for knowing what kinds of Internet activity will catch like wildfire. The loyal users his sites attract also attract billions of dollars from advertisers.

This matters to me even more so because I am in publishing, and because I’ve seen so many people in the print and digital publishing worlds that take themselves way too seriously. The big shots at the corporate companies want to tell you that you have to do it their way, they know more than you because they’ve been in the business X amount of years, they won’t take a chance on something they don’t understand. And here comes Ben Huh to stick it to the Man, with his indie company and his sites that are a bigger success story than anything going on at Time, Inc. or Hearst.

What tops it all off, from what I can tell of press coverage, Ben Huh hasn’t let the fame and success change him. He’s just a down to earth, normal guy who’s tapped into his smarts and taken all the right risks. Millions of people laugh each day because of the sites he’s behind. He and his company help us take life a little easier. He’s not making trips to Africa or donating millions to India. However he has shown anyone who cares to look that we can make our own way; find our niche in the world that creates a win/win situation for everyone. He’s an inspiration to me, and my person of the year.

- Vanessa is a blogger for The Sorbate. Check out her bio to see where her view comes from.

Related Links

Ben Huh Site

Building a Media Empire, Time.com

I Can Has Internet Millions, Slate.com