Tech innovations that improve our quality of life

Editor's Note: During the first 10 years of the 21st century, technology and the Internet have dramatically changed people's lives. The following are the top 10 tech/Internet innovations we selected as the most influential to people's lives during the past decade.

Taobao

"Why do you need a shopping mall if you have Taobao?" This is how millions of Taobaoers feel. As the largest online shopping site in China, it is becoming an indispensable part of many people's lives.

It makes transactions easy with its E-payment - Alipay, and provides the jobless, students and shopkeepers with a platform to start their own business easily. Tax, import control and geographic distance are all pointless when it comes to Taobao. As the leader of C2C e-commerce, Taobao has become a favorite shopping site for 300 million netizens in China.

Youtube.com

As long as you have a DV, you are ready to go. Everyone is a director here and you can upload and share videos on this website.

It uses Adobe Flash Video technology to display a wide variety of user-generated video content, including movie clips, TV clips, and music videos, as well as amateur content such as video blogging and original short videos. Fans all around the globe see Youtube as their "memory database." With the domestic video sharing website Youku and Tudou booming, more and more netizens are becoming fans of video sharing.

iPhone

The smartphone designed and marketed by Apple Inc. wins acclaim for its design and the multi-touch screen function, which has accelerated the evolution of mobile phone products, and has been a Muse for later generations of smartphones.

The iPhone was introduced in 2007, and was named "the Invention of the Year" by Time magazine that year.

It boasts features such as touch screen and voice control, and provides hundreds of third-party applications through its App Store.

The iPhone, together with Apple Inc's iPod and MacBook, have been must-haves for faddists.

QQ

QQ numbers now outnumber those of mobile phones in China. A 10-year-old might not own a mobile phone, but many kindergarteners have already started exchanging their QQ numbers.

As the most popular free instant messaging system in China, it currently has over 300 million users. QQ face, QQ game and Q coin have become modern cultural icons, more recognizable than any other chatting tool application of the past 10 years. It is a money-saving tool for personal and professional communication, and also has helped create countless romantic relationships.

GPS

The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a US space-based global navigation satellite system. It provides positioning, navigation, and timing services to worldwide users on a continuous basis in all weather, day and night, anywhere on or near the Earth. which has an unobstructed view of four or more GPS satellites. It was originally developed for the military, but now it serves as a good friend to drivers who have a bad sense of direction, a great helper in catching criminals and a private detective to discover cheating spouses.