Mark Zuckerberg Leads Media Power Ranking

LONDON: Facebook founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg takes the top spot on the MediaGuardian 100 annual list of the most powerful people in media, while Rupert Murdoch fell from fourth place to sixth and son James dropped off the top ten.

Zuckerberg, who last year was seventh on the list, was bumped up due to the immense success of the social networking site, which has an expected revenue of $4 billion in 2011, double that earned in 2010. The 27-year-old’s move to the top spot bumps Steve Jobs, who was number one last year, to number five.

Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey came in second, thanks to the continued success of the microblogging service and the launch of the smartphone payment service Square. In third place is Google CEO Larry Page, who will likely move up next year if the new Google+ service takes off. BBC director general Mark Thompson is in the number four spot.

The top ten also includes Daily Mail editor-in-chief Paul Dacre (7), WPP group chief executive Sir Martin Sorrell (8), X Factor creator Simon Cowell (9) and new entry Lord Justice Leveson (10).

MediaGuardian said that in the 11-year history of its power 100 ranking, "no single event has had such a seismic impact on the U.K.’s media landscape in such a short space of time as the phone-hacking scandal at the News of the World." This accounts for Rupert Murdoch’s fall to sixth, with James dropping to 11 and Rebekah Brooks, the former News International chief executive who has now resigned, disappearing altogether.

In ranking the top ten most important people in television, Mark Thompson tops the list again this year. Cowell follows in the number two spot. New entry Danny Cohen, the controller of BBC One, is at number three, followed by ITV’s Peter Fincham and Northern & Shell’s Richard Desmond. New entries Lord Patten, BBC Trust chairman, and ITV chief executive Adam Crozier rank number seven and eight, respectively. Elisabeth Murdoch comes in at number nine, with George Entwistle, the director of BBC Vision, capping off the top ten.