I'm thinking Dave Winer. - Christopher Harley

scoble I'll be glad when your O'Reilly phase peaks - Steve Gillmor from IM

I could not single out twitterer of the year - it's the amalgamation that makes the value. So it is: all of us! - Joelle Nebbe (iphigenie)

Tim O'Reilly, but also Kathy Sierra. - Helen Sventitsky

Zappos, Whole Foods and Paula Drumm of HR Block did well this year IMHO. - Gerald Buckley

Depends on what the criteria is. - Rochelle

I nominate @ronbrinkmann for Twitterer of the year- in the most hesitation category. TWIP listeners will know what I mean. :) - Roberto Bonini

Tim O'Reilly. Actually, that is nearly the only Twitter feed I follow. - Sean McBride

twitterer of the year? FriendFeed - Steve Gillmor from IM

TIM O'REILLY!!! - Susan Beebe

@comcastcares - Steve Garfield from twhirl

Robert you're a pretty damn good twitterer yourself! :) I nominate you! - Susan Beebe

Gillmor called it. - Christopher Harley

Really? Is the next poll going to be "Breather of the Year"? - Sam Harrelson

Brian Solis, Guy Kawasaki, Francine Hardaway, Loic LeMeur also produce lots of good tweets / content - Susan Beebe

@iaindodsworth for making @tweetdeck and making twitter immensely useful otherwise all the people I follow whether we share or not. Twitter is best decentralized and not focused on a few individual "leaders". - Jay Gilmore

Tim O'reilly is definitely at the top of the list - so much amazing oreilly filter everyday - I wish @umairh used it more... can always hope for 2009 - @davemc500hats is another daily fave. - andrew

Spare me, please, the next top 10 list of 'best twitterers'. What criteria do you use? how does that apply to the twitter population at large? given the vast array of uses for twitter, how could anyone possibly make such a designation? and why would they want to? - Karoli

might be more appropriate to name us all as survivor of the year. Looking back and thinking I can't wait for the door to slam 2008's butt right out. Along with George Bush. - Karoli

interesting discussion in that robert is essentially asking us to filter the filterers - another new fave: @jackcheng - andrew

Gillmor: you can come back after Tuesday. :-) - Robert Scoble

Didn't Obama get like a gazillion followers? Shouldn't he be considered? - Ed Moltzen

Tim O'reilly in my opinion is Twitterer Of The Year - Nicholas James

Susan: funny, in past three weeks I've done interviews with Guy Kawasaki and Loic Le Meur, too. (Loic's will be up Monday). I hope to interview all the top Twitterers soon. :-) - Robert Scoble

Karoli: human beings love lists. You can fight that impulse if you want. Me? I'll just put you on another list. :-) - Robert Scoble

can we add new voices to usual suspects? Seems like new media, same people :) - Valeria Maltoni

The 1000 or so people I follow have far more value than any one tweeter. - Ryan Sholin

Are we talking tech? Because those people seem techy to me. As a non-tech, I've utilized Twitter to rant, tell peeps what "I am doing", etc. Are average joes up for consideration? What constitutes Twitterer of the Year? Do you have to follow/be followed by 1000s? - Derrick

Derrick: Jay Rosen is a journalism professor and tweets about impacts of new media on journalism, mostly. He's hardly "geeky." My "Twitter of the Year" has to make me smarter, more informed, entertain, a better human. - Robert Scoble

Paul Kedrosky from infectiousgreed.com http://twitter.com/pkedrosky - Morgan

@Scobleizer LOL! why didn't you say so in the first place? - Valeria Maltoni

Valeria: you blew your chance to do just that. I hate people who complain but who don't come up with suggestions. You gotta do better than that. - Robert Scoble

Robert, my response is here: http://ur1.ca/0cyj - Karoli

Robert: So does someone who doesn't write about, develops, or works in new media have a chance? Could a mother of three in Iowa who finds herself immersed in Twitter and/or FF have a chance? Not a criticism, but it seems like all likely candidates are cut from the same cloth. It's one thing to talk *about* new media, and another to be a person who simply utilizes it. - Derrick

Mine is Pivotal Labs who seemingly brought stability to the Twitter platform. [edit] Because if they hadn't turned that around we'd be talking Fail Whale instead. - AJ Kohn

Shel mentioned this guy the other day, and I think he's hands-down Twitterer of the year: James Karl Buck, the grad student who kept himself from being disappeared in an Egyptian jail and put Twitter in the headlines with the tweet "ARRESTED." http://is.gd/8VR - Chris Baskind

Chris - I could go for that. That story is compelling as all hell. - Derrick

Derrick: put forth your suggestions and explain why. I put forward my two. I only read 20,000 Twitterers. There are millions of others so I'm sure there are worthy candidates that I don't know about, which is why I'm hoping you all will bring them into this discussion rather than just complain. - Robert Scoble

Chris: that certainly is a good candidate. I'm not sure that elevates him to the top of the list, but that demonstrates we need a separate list for "Tweet of the year." - Robert Scoble

@Scobleizer I agree with those who say it's a combination of voices. I also think that people change their style over time on each medium - depending on the feedback they receive. - Valeria Maltoni

I still stand by my choice of @stephenfry. He fulfills all the criteria and has entertained and educated me enormously tweeting throughout his travels around the world. - Nicola Quinn

Well, it certainly would step around the objections raised here: http://is.gd/cIdC - Chris Baskind

By the way, I really appreciate and enjoy Jay Rosen's tweets. I follow him. I think Tim O'Reilly is great but I don't follow on Twitter, I do subscribe to his RSS feed though. Let's hear some nominations for foreign language twitterers while we're at it. It's not all about English-speaking Americans, right? - Karoli

Robert: Not a complaint, just trying to make sense of it all. Twitter's a big world and there are tons of hubs that never intersect. Twitterer of the Year would be hard to no matter who's asking. - Derrick

They already mentioned my two candidates: Stephen Fry and Jay Rosen. - George The Writer

@Scobleizer - "hate" is a strong word. Adrian Ho at Zeus Jones http://twitter.com/adrianho; Chris Guillebeau http://twitter.com/chrisgu...; Alfonso Guerra http://twitter.com/Huperni... are my top picks. - Valeria Maltoni

Valeria: yeah, it was over the top, this is much better, now I have new people to check out. Thanks! - Robert Scoble

Must there be an award for everything? That said, James Karl Buck -or someone else who did something meaningful and not just one of the "usual suspects" please. - helzerman

@Scobleizer I knew you would love @andreasklinger idea of ::: Tweet Of The Year ::: http://twitter.com/nobabe... http://friendfeed.com/andreas... - Margit Hinke

i don't know... i love @stephenfry and what he is all about - but the signal/noise ratio? ... the most interesting outcome of this discussion is the example Tim Orielly has set - provide great filtered content - high signal noise based on experience... one would imagine there are will be a thousand competitors for the web space at this time next year and hopefully hundreds for each imaginable important topic for us as a collective humanity - energy, human rights, macro-economics etc... - andrew

Guy Kawasaki. Twitter would pay him to Tweet - if doesn't already. - Bill Romanos

You aint bad yourself Bill Romanos - bcultral