People and events of 2006

Continuing my end of year wrap-up ...

Top 5 news events of 2006:

1. The Democrats take control of Congress and President Bush replaces Donald Rumsfeld as Defense Secretary with Robert Gates - hopefully signalling a change of strategy in Iraq.
2. North Korea tests nuclear weapons on 9 October - Kim Jong Il has to be taken seriously.
3. Google buys YouTube - confirmed the arrival of Web 2.0.
4. Saddam Hussein sentenced to death - the end of an era.
5. Italy wins the World Cup - the sporting achievement of the year.

Top 5 people of 2006 - the people who mattered, not necessary the "best" people of 2005:

1. Mahmoud Ahrmadinejad - by pursuing nuclear weapons, supporting Shi'ite groups in Lebanon and Iraq, and hosting a Holocaust deniers conference, Ahrmadinejad has become a powerful leader in the Middle East and the Muslim world more generally.
2. Al Gore - put the environment back on the global political agenda.
3. Kim Jong Il - in October proved that North Korea possessed nuclear weapons.
4. Nancy Pelosi - helped orchestrate the Democrats take control of both chambers in the US Congress in 2006 and next year will become the first woman to be the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
5. Condoleeza Rice - had an extraordinarily busy year trying to maintain global peace and stability and even though she answers to George W Bush, she remains popular at home and abroad.

Top 5 things that changed the world in 2006:

1. YouTube - leading the Web 2.0 revolution, YouTube has thrust user-generated content into the mainstream.
2. Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth - people are beginning to feel not only that the environment might be important, but that it might affect them.
3. North Korea tests nuclear weapons - the threat of nuclear war seems real again.
4. Second Life - the popularity of this virtual world is more than just a gaming trend, it is a whole new world of possibility and opportunity; at times this world seems like a much better place than our real world.
5. Pluto is no longer a planet - this may not have changed the world much, but the universe now feels pretty different.