TIME 100

As most of our readers know, every year we do a big dead tree edition on the 100 people that mattered most in the past 12 months. Today, the 200 nominees are up. Let the voting for the most influential person of 2009 begin. Will it be President Obama? Sarah Palin? Nancy Pelosi? Katheryn Bigelow? Rahul Singh? Sandra Bullock? And, yes, as South Korean pop star Rain proves most years, this really is a straight popularity contest: the winner is the one with the most clicks.