2010: A year in review, December

Posted by Libby Plummer on December 31, 2010 Leave a comment (1) Go to comments

Samsung Nexus S unveiled, Angry Birds mania and the Pocket-lint Gadget Awards
2010: A year in review, December

New Year's Eve is upon us so it's time to prep the party poppers, chill the bubbly and make the resolutions that you'll have forgotten by the morning. But before all that, it's time to take a look at the biggest stories from the past 12 months - last stop: December.

As January always brings the gigantic CES tech show in Las Vegas, December tends to be a bit of a quiet month for tech news as the the big manufacturers keep their cards close to their chest and the rest of the world prepares for a much-needed rest over the festive season.

We kicked off December with our very own App-vent Calendar - where each day, we opened the door on a new Christmas-themed app. The star of the show was Angry Birds Seasons, a festive update to the wildly popular game that gadgets fans have been going crazy over. Angry Birds fever continued to grow with one fan even constructing a gingerbread house inspired by the game. We carried out a much-read 'unboxing' and hands-on test of the new range of Angry Birds plush toys.

In slightly more serious news, we saw the arrival of the world's first Android 2.3 phone in the shape of the Samsung Nexus S, while the white iPhone 4 got its official release date, well not so much of a date as a season - the irritatingly vague spring 2011.

Google's Chrome 8 browser became official, while the search engine giant also launched its eBooks store and the design of Facebook profile pages got a major overhaul.

We got an indicator of the powerful influence that the iPad is exerting on the publishing industry when UK tabloid newspaper The Sun announced that it would offer an iPad edition on Christmas Day - the first to be published on 25 December for 41 years. Among other festive revelations was the news that Avatar would be getting its 3DTV premiere on Sky 3D on Christmas Eve.

On 22 December, Skype went down after a technical glitch, causing a storm of criticism on Twitter and panicked emails all over the world. The problem was sorted within a couple of days and Skype launched an updated version of its iPhone app just after Christmas, complete with video calling.

December was also the start of our preparations for January's Las Vegas-based tech show CES, including a guide as to what it's all about. You can follow all the coverage in January here.

Naturally, the big news in December was the annual Pocket-lint Gadget Awards. This is where the tech industry gathers every December to congratulate the makers of the best gizmos of the year, while simultaneously trying to drink the bar dry. You can catch a glimpse of the winners in our special awards image gallery.

The 2010 award for the Most Shamless Use of a Gadget has to go to Aussie popstrel Dannii Minougue for flashing a Swarovski-crystal adorned BlackBerry Bold with the the words "Vote Matt" emblazoned on the back in reference to her X-Factor finalist protege Matt Cardle. Not to be outdone, Pocket-lint's own News Editor knocked up his own version (using the medium of PhotoShop) to garner votes for the site's News Reporter extraordinaire, Paul Lamkin, when he was nominated for a journalism award.

For a closer look at these events and the rest of December take a look at our weekly round-ups from the month or head straight to the archive itself.

1 Comments.

Government auction Lubbock January 1, 2011 at 9:26 am

Government auction Lubbock
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