Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer and Bill and Hillary Clinton were named among eight top choices for Time's Person of the Year, the magazine announced Tuesday.
Undocumented Americans, President Barack Obama, Apple CEO Tim Cook, Italian physicist Fabiola Giannati and Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani student activist who survived an assassination attempt by the Taliban, rounded out the shortlist of contenders.
For the last 85 years, the newsweekly has selected a person, group or thing that its editors decide had the greatest impact during the last year. Last year's choice, selected amid the Arab Spring, the Occupy movement and rioting across Europe, was The Protester.
Time's reader poll this year, commandeered by a campaign launched on internet forums like 4Chan, elected Kim Jong-Un, North Korea's dictator, as Person of the Year. He won about 5.6 million votes.
Other frontrunners for the readers' pick were comedian Jon Stewart, Burmese leaders Aung San Suu Kyi and Thein Sein and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie.
Two readers' choices made it onto the editors' shortlist: President Morsi and what was called on the readers' poll Undocumented Immigrants.
Time will name its official choice Wednesday morning on NBC's "Today" show, Time.com and on the magazine's Twitter feed, @Time [5].