id say george bush, obama, bin ladin or arnold schwarzaneggar

Hu Jintao

I'm going with ronald mcdonald - i'm serious.

Jesus H Christ, Buddha, Mohammed - Can't go past industry leaders like that...

Hu's Jintao?

MJ was supposedly the worlds most recognisable person in the nineties.

President Obama now or even Bruno

Jesus. No contest.

Isaac.

Falco was pretty big in the 80's

Falco!!! Hehe, haven't heard that for years!!!

Some options: Einstein, Da Vinci, Mao, Elvis, Hitler, Stalin, Walt Disney, Princess Diana, Shakespeare, Gandhi, Bill Gates, Madonna, Piccaso, Pamela Anderson.

Outside of the religious figures, I think Mao Zedong could be a reasonable chance with possibly Gandhi behind him.

60% of the world's population is in Asia and almost a third of that is in China. All generations in China would be aware of Mao, though many (especially rural) would have limited awareness of western icons or even key religious figures.

Obviously India is very populous also, but outside of Gandhi and some Bollywood stars, I'm not sure if there would be a common personality that all castes and generations would know.

Africa might be too sparse and disconnected to really hold much sway and Europe accounts for only about 10% of the world's population.

Including religious icons, Buddha would probably not make the top two and while Hinduism has a significant following, its identities vary. You'd comfortably pick Jesus and Mohammed as the top two identities.

I think I'd rank it:

Jesus
Mohammed
Mao
Gandhi

What about Buddah?

I would say Chuck. Maybe Wesley second. I don't know any other Person's.

Lets only count people that we actually know for a fact they exsisted, so that counts out jesus.

Mickey Mouse

Judging by all the d##kheads that prance around in Che Guevara t-shirts he must be up there (even if most aforementioneds probably think it's a picture Jesus or just some random "cool looking dude")...

Castro would have to be up there as well - in spite of being the President of a small Carrib. island.

Not many people dispute that Jesus existed as a historical figure.

Jerry Denard, without question with Paris McCurdy coming in a close 2nd.

I dispute Jesus ever existed. Hasslehoff is way cooler and if "Jesus" did exist, so what, he wasn't on Baywatch or Knight Rider.

Muhammad Ali
Mike Tyson
Hulk Hogan

paul mccartney anyone?

Luke Skywalker

Fabio.

The most beautiful man in the world..

Julius Hodge

ELVIS

...thankyou very much

Your mum.

boom patrol
ESp
MW
Dicko
beer is sweet
Mystro
matt ryan
skin
DB5
Shin Splints
Nutwork :You all get an F for not reading the question and not doing your research!What is on TV is not world popular.He is talking other /also western democracies.

Rest of you are probably right depending on the education of those peasants of the 100 millions.

Bo Hamburger

/end thread

David Beckham. Global interest of football and celebrities... gotta be up there.

Shotclock - F for not realising most of us were joking

spot on Skin

Fabio's not real?

and Luke Skywalker??
WTF!

Most famous person dead or alive.. obviously it's not gonna be anyone current.. take into account all the previous generations that neve got to know them. Most famous will be people from the ancient periods like Socrates, Alexander the Great etc... all the generations from their time forward (ours included of course)know of them.

hey shotclock, hoff aint gona send you a clock for christmas or a pair of autographed baywatch trunks, so who's laughing now

Rodney, do you really think that the youth of today know who Socrates or A the G was?

Or 800 million rural workers in China, or the same in India?

At dinner last night, someone put forward Sachin Tendulkar as a possible top ten candidate - he'd have saturation in India, the UK, Australia, NZ, South Africa, but not much after that. Maybe a billion people all up. Still, probably more than any Bollywood personality.

Interesting show on Micheal Jackson last night on Channel 9. It was insinuated that he manipulated the whole Whacko Jacko thing for publicity and cast doubts whether Joe abused his son, or whether this was another stunt to sell records.

They were very scathing of his alledged paedofile activities and commented that the father of the alledged victim was a screen writer (wrote men in tights) and was more interested in advancing his career than worrying about his son's welfare. Big call by the show.

The worrying thing was that they claimed Jacko was arrested after negotiations broke down between the father and Jacko. The other things in the show were that the kid was able to describe "telltale marks" on his private parts, and they showed footage of an alledged secret bedroom off of his main bedroom.

The show also documented an incident at the Mirage Hotel where he alledgedly held a party with many young boys and trashed the room as well as writing words in faesces on sheets. Eeeeew if true.

While he was never convicted of paedofilia and there are always two sides to the story, the documentary painted him in a very dim light.

I wasn't joking.

You were just using a sample size of one in your polling.

(That's what she said!)

Forgetting about Jesus and Ceasar and sticking to the last 100 years, i would say:
Hitler, Einstein, Bush, Michael Jackson, Elvis Presley. Without an order.

I can't mention the Queen or the Pope, cause they are famous only as institutions, not necessarily as individuals. Not everybody knows their name, or whether they're the same ones as 10 years before.

Obama is world famous, and he's definately getting to the top, but he needs some time.Maybe in 5-10 years.

brett maher

Are you stupid? Elvis Presley? Try going to Asia (where 70% of the world is) and do a survey of who knows Elvis Presley versus who knows Mao Zedong... typical westernised, egocentric, arrogant muppets. Don't even realise your country is falling...