2008 in review

Lehman Brothers

The bank was deliberately not rescued: a fateful decision.

💡 Did you know? Images of employees carrying their belongings out in boxes became iconic.

Barack Obama

He clearly defeated Republican John McCain.

💡 Did you know? Hundreds of thousands celebrated election night in Chicago's Grant Park.

Iceland

The krona crashed and the IMF had to step in.

💡 Did you know? Relative to its economy, it was one of the biggest banking collapses ever.

Beijing

China used the Games as a grand world stage.

💡 Did you know? The national stadium owes its nickname to its steel lattice structure.

Usain Bolt

He also won relay gold in world-record time, but it was stripped in 2017 because teammate Nesta Carter had doped.

💡 Did you know? He won the 100 m despite celebrating before the line; a year later in Berlin he ran the still-standing 9.58.

Michael Phelps

He surpassed Mark Spitz's seven golds from 1972.

💡 Did you know? Phelps collected 23 Olympic golds in total.

Spain

It began Spain's era of titles (Euro, World Cup, Euro).

💡 Did you know? Spain's tiki-taka shaped a whole generation of football.

Kosovo

Serbia and Russia, among others, still refuse recognition.

💡 Did you know? Five EU states don't recognise Kosovo either, including Spain.

Georgia

Russia subsequently recognised both regions as "independent".

💡 Did you know? The war broke out right during the Olympic opening ceremony.

Sichuan

Shoddy school construction drew massive criticism.

💡 Did you know? China declared its first three-day national mourning for quake victims.

Nargis

The Irrawaddy delta was flooded metres deep.

💡 Did you know? Nargis ranks among the deadliest storms of modern history.

Satoshi Nakamoto

The paper described electronic cash without banks.

💡 Did you know? Bitcoin's smallest unit is called a "satoshi" in his honour.

App Store

It launched with about 500 apps.

💡 Did you know? "App" was named US word of the year in 2010.

Large Hadron Collider

In 2012 it detected the long-sought Higgs boson.

💡 Did you know? Its ring tunnel measures 27 kilometres around.

Mumbai

The attacks lasted three days.

💡 Did you know? The famous Taj Mahal Palace hotel burned for days.

Raúl Castro

Fidel remained the background "Máximo Líder" for years.

💡 Did you know? Fidel Castro died in 2016 at the age of 90.

Heath Ledger

"The Dark Knight" became 2008's global cinema phenomenon.

💡 Did you know? Many consider Ledger's Joker the greatest comic-book role ever.

Falcon 1

One more failure would likely have ended SpaceX.

💡 Did you know? Today SpaceX launches more rockets than entire nations.

Sebastian Vettel

He won from pole in pouring rain.

💡 Did you know? From 2010, Vettel took four world titles in a row.

Street View

In Germany, hundreds of thousands later had their houses blurred.

💡 Did you know? Because of the protests, German Street View remained patchy for years.