The iPhone
It’s a computer that fits in your pocket. And if you’re lucky enough to live in a sparsely populated area, it’ll occasionally allow you to make and receive phone calls, too!
Nintendo Wii
“Serious” gamers may scoff at the Wii’s lack of hardcore titles, and weak sauce 480p resolution. But there’s no doubt that the innovative controls, and newbie-friendly attitude, have turned tons of people (back) on to videogames, and that’s good for everyone.
USB 2.0
USB 2.0 pumped up the speed of its predecessor by several orders of magnitude, up to 480 Mbit/s. Sure, it’s no FireWire speed-wise, but for sheer ubiquity, you gotta love USB.
Facebook
MySpace might have gotten to the social networking party earlier (actually, it was Friendster), but it’s Facebook that has captured the internet’s attention (for now). We’re just happy to be able to keep up with friends and acquaintances so easily.
Flash Drives
When Apple killed the floppy drive, people were horrified. But with a 32GB flash drive always in our pocket these days, that outrage seems comically short-sighted now. Not to mention, you can't carry around a floppy shaped like your favorite food.
Dropbox
Even the most die-hard Apple fans have to admit that MobileMe’s iDisk is pretty much a bag of hurt, to borrow a phrase from The Steve. Dropbox, on the other hand, syncs to Macs, PCs and iPhones instantly and flawlessly. We have no idea how we ever lived without it.
Gmail
All your mail are belong to Gmail, or at least it should be. Anywhere access, and tons of useful features your desktop mail client doesn’t have… all for the price of some unobtrusive text ads that we’ve learned not to look at anyway.
BitTorrent
BitTorrent gets a bad rap as the preferred method for pirating music, movies, and TV on the internet. But it’s also a genius method for distributing any kind of digital goods, from Creative Commons films to free e-books and gigantic open-source software packages.
Cell phones that fit in your pocket
In the olden days, cell phones were so big that they required a shoulder bag to contain the enormous hardware—and they were super-expensive to use. The svelte phones of today are easier to carry, more convenient to use, and do way more than that giant Uniden handset could have ever dreamed of.
