Wrap It Up, 2021

Did you do all your holiday shopping on Black Friday like normal people or were you still frantically calculating delivery times last week like me?

It’s that time of the year when we are making lists (checking them twice), looking ahead, but also thinking back, rewinding and reviewing. I found out about my yearly CO2 savings from riding Bolt scooters, saw my Year in Review from Facebook and Instagram, and got my 2021 Wrapped from Spotify.

In the year when we continued to have an on-and-off relationship with normal life and Big Tech grew even bigger, these are some of the topics we discussed. And I wouldn’t be much of an ex-journalist if I didn’t look into what happened next to give you a follow-up.

Richard Branson flew to the edge of Space in July, Jeff Bezos followed, and then it was trending.

The Follow-Up: So many people have gone up by now that the FFA decided to stop awarding their winged participation trophy after 18 years. Fortunately, William Shatner managed to get his.

When you’ve created a game that attracts over 350 million active players monthly and brings in $5.1 billion revenue in a year, you’re not that enthusiastic about Apple taking a 30% cut in the App Store. Epic Games bypassed the payment system intentionally, Apple blocked Fortnite, Epic sued. We watched.

The Follow Up: The district court issued an injunction, but Apple appealed and the appeals court placed a stay. Meanwhile, the App store payment monopoly is uninterrupted.

The pandemic disrupted the standard work arrangements and probably changed our views on work location forever. Some large tech companies adapted and offered their employees a remote or hybrid option. Some of the largest like Google and Apple stuck to their guns and insisted on bringing everyone back.

The Follow-Up: The debate would probably still be ongoing, but the Omicron variant has once again proven what happens with the best-laid plans of mice and men.

Frances Haugen leaked internal documents that revealed the social media giant’s (let’s be kind and call them) dubious practices with serious repercussions across societies in the company’s biggest PR crisis since its formation.

The Follow-Up: Not what you’d expect. No charges, no dramatic resignations, no boycotts. However, the company is having some trouble with internal inflation while Mark Zuckerberg sips tea in his metaverse.

I am so trying not to say it was a hell of a year, but it was. We’ve opened two new offices in London and Podgorica, grew by 92 people, defended our title as Croatia’s best employer.

Oh, and there’s a follow-up here, too. This month Infinum made its first acquisition and welcomed the Macedonian company 3P Development to our ranks. We’re thrilled about our 30 new colleagues (not like when your parents tell you that you’re getting a special present for Christmas and it’s a baby brother, but really) and are already looking forward to exciting new projects we’ll take on together.