Yes, we are still in a pandemic. Yes, this year things happened that we did not like very much. But this does not mean that in 2021 some good things did not happen. In this holiday season and a few days before celebrating the arrival of a new year, we bring you a list of the 10 best things that happened this year in the world of technology .
Not everything has been bad, 10 good news for 2021!
For the tech world, 2021 has been a fantastic year . While there was some news that made us a bit sad, like LG officially stopped making phones or OPPO laid off 20% of its employees after merging with OnePlus, there is also a lot to celebrate this year. Let’s see what was the best news that happened in 2021.
We vaccinate faster thanks to technology
2021 will be remembered as an unprecedented year when it comes to public health. This is because the largest and fastest vaccination campaign in history was carried out. All you have to do is type in the Google search engine “people vaccinated covid-19” to see that almost 50% of the world’s population has been vaccinated in one year.
Before the COVID-19 pandemic, creating a vaccine and immunization campaigns were slow processes that took years, even decades. Therefore, this 2021 has been an incredible year in the field of vaccination and all thanks to modern technology . Not only were innovative techniques used to develop vaccines in record time, but also social media and mobile apps have had an important influence on this achievement.
Artists found a new digital market
This year artists discovered a new way to commercialize their art , and all thanks to blockchain technology. One of the most talked about topics of 2021 was non-fungible tokens or NFTs, which went viral due to the high prices paid for them.
But the most important innovation that NFTs have brought about is the possibility that anyone can sell their photographs, videos or illustrations on the Internet at any price they want. This is how NFTs have brought about a resurgence for the art market. Even if you want to try your luck with your content, you can sell your Instagram posts as NFT.
The consecration of folding mobiles: they are back to stay
Who would say that one of the best smartphones of 2021 would be a folding mobile? Yes, this year Samsung could not meet the demand for the Galaxy Z Fold 3 and Flip 3 due to its resounding success in the market. For a couple of years, the big mobile brands have once again bet on the design of folding terminals. However, it is in this year that we finally have models that are up to the standard of the already accustomed high-end phones .
2021 has been a year where the main problems that folding models had, such as the fragility of the screen, have been solved. In addition, the success that Samsung has had with its folding models has prompted the competition to launch terminals such as the Honor Magic Fold and the Oppo Find N that wants to compete with the Galaxy Z Fold 3.
The reign of electric cars begins
This 2021 something historic has happened. For the first time in the history of the European automotive industry an electric car was the best seller . This happened in September with the Tesla Model 3, and it is just one of the milestones that electric vehicles have achieved during the year.
In the first half of 2021, the electric car market registered a sales growth of 168% compared to the previous year . More and more manufacturers are joining the production of electric cars such as Xiaomi or Huawei. Even this year the European Commission established an agreement between countries to end the sale of internal combustion cars in 2035 . All of this is not only good for the electric car market, but also for the ecosystem.
Space travel has become more “normal”
A couple of decades ago traveling to the Moon or Mars was crazy. Not only because of the achievement it meant for the human being, but also because of the expenses involved in these space missions. But today, in the middle of 2021, space travel has already been normalized .
This is thanks to companies like Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin who have not only managed the first private space flights, but also for making these missions increasingly profitable. In 2021 we learned about the project of a reusable spacecraft called Starship with which Elon Musk intends to reach Mars and demonstrate that it is possible to reduce the costs of space transport.
Elon Musk has stated that this groundbreaking craft will make its maiden flight in early 2022 . He has even revealed his company’s plans to create a factory where more Starship will be produced. Everything seems to indicate that this 2021 has brought us closer to fulfilling the dream of being an interstellar race.
The union of two worlds: Windows launches compatibility with Android
This year we met the new version of the famous Microsoft operating system for computers: Windows 11 . And one of the most important features that debuted in this version was the compatibility with the Android operating system. And although initially only Android apps could be installed through the Amazon Appstore, this new feature has allowed, among other things, to install the Google Play Store on a computer.
Likewise, the union of the most important PC operating system with the one most used on mobiles has made Google make the decision to bring Android games to Windows 11 in 2022 with Play Games. The only thing missing is that Apple also joins the party of allowing compatibility between operating systems (although we see this as impossible).
The expansion of 5G technology
Although 5G began its boom in early 2020 (coinciding with the beginning of the pandemic, which raised concern about the relationship of this technology with the disease), it was this year that it ceased to be a unique feature of range smartphones. high .
In 2021, the vast majority of mobile brands began to design cheap smartphones with 5G technology. This is thanks to the emergence of new processors for the mid and low range that support this technology such as the Snapdragon 778G + 5G, 695 5G and 480+ 5G. This is how this year we have learned of a mobile like the Honor Play 30 Plus that comes with 5G and is around 150 euros, while the 5 cheapest 5G terminals in 2020 were around 300 euros.
One of the most important media events of the beginning of 2021 was when Twitter finally decided to permanently suspend the account of Donald Trump, the former president of the United States. This measure was one of the first we would see during a year in which Twitter’s safe mode was released, among other functions aimed at improving security and combating misinformation on the platform .
But Twitter is not the only one that in 2021 has made an effort to create a more secure environment for its users. Instagram has created a tool to prohibit unknown adults from talking to minors, Facebook has the project of launching a social network for children and Google has activated SafeSearch by default to prevent children from finding results that are not suitable for their age. This is how in 2021 we should be grateful that social networks have taken the security of their platforms seriously.
We create oxygen on Mars
Another of the great technological achievements of this 2021 is that, for the first time in history, humans produced oxygen on another planet. The main obstacle to fulfilling the dream of living in space is the lack of oxygen. NASA set out to solve this problem and has done so thanks to a golden box-shaped instrument called MOXIE .
In mid-April, NASA surprised us by announcing that the MOXIE device had managed to make 5 grams of oxygen on Mars from carbon dioxide in just 1 hour . This is the amount an astronaut needs to breathe for 10 minutes. Although it seems little, it is a historic step that humanity has taken to make life on other planets more and more possible.
We learned about the possibilities of the metaverse
Finally, we could not finish this review of what the world of technology was in 2021 without talking about the metaverse. This idea that Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook popularized with the change of the company’s name to Meta, has undoubtedly been one of the most viral topics on the Internet . This has caused a large number of companies to announce their plans to create a metaverse, including Niantic, the brand behind Pokémon GO.
We are still far from seeing the idea of the metaverse materialize, but thanks to 2021 we already know that work is being done so that we can soon immerse ourselves in these virtual environments . And you … What do you think of these 10 good news that 2021 left us?
