In a big year for gaming, the "arguably best new game of the year" was this sci-fi first-person shooter classic. "Every level is perfectly paced and balanced and graced with soaring architectural compositions," raved Time.

Just three years after it was hatched in Mark Zuckerberg's Harvard dorm room, and one year after it moved beyond college and high-school campuses, the social network "[came] into its own" and was valued at more than $1 billion (it would eventually hit $1 trillion by 2021). All that, plus you could still "poke" your friends.

Only 10 months after the debut of the iPhone, Google and tech giants such as T-Mobile and Motorola announced an open-source platform for mobile devices. The first Android-equipped phones appeared in 2008. By 2016, the operating system dominated 82 percent of all new smartphones sold. Android continues to dominate in 2022 -- these are the best Android phones you can buy now.

The N95 "promises to revolutionize the market" according to CNET's 2007 review. Its "cutting-edge 5-megapixel camera" helped win it the nod over Apple's game changer. At about $750, it was also more expensive than the iPhone.

Amazon.com's Jeff Bezos unveiled his company's flagship e-reader in November 2007. The first-generation device cost $399, weighed about 10 ounces and stored up to 200 books, more than twice as many as the Sony PRS-500, which debuted in 2006.

A year after "Who Killed the Electric Car?" documented the demise of the green auto in the 1990s, General Motors became the first US automaker to preview a plug-in hybrid. The Volt made its commercial debut in 2011 en route to becoming the top-selling plug-in car. EVs are still a hot topic in 2022.

With its iPhone blowing minds and budgets, Apple returned in September 2007 with an iPhone-esque look (and price) for its MP3 player. The iPod Touch added Wi-Fi capability to the line's bag of tricks. It originally sold for $399 (roughly £320 or AU$520). You can still buy an iPod today, believe it or not.

With Hulu still in development and Netflix streaming only getting started, Joost was the leader in the "internet TV" space. In 2007, it had 1 million beta testers for its "episodes of CSI... old G.I. Joe cartoons... [and] the NHL playoffs." By 2009, it had been beaten at its game by Hulu and by growing "too big, too fast."

2007 was the year the cathode ray tube -- the boxy TV that had been the TV set since forever -- got kicked to the curb in favor of the sleek LCD. Sales of the latter outpaced the former for the first time.

In October 2007, the Grammy-winning band digitally released its seventh album, "In Rainbows," and asked fans to pay what they thought it was worth (from zero up to "about $212"). The then-radical pricing experiment ended two months later, when the album was issued on CD, but by then you were probably already listening to it via your iHome docking station.