When you try and condense a year of technology into one column, you become acutely aware of just how much happens in 365 days.

We’ve seen social media buzzwords like selfie become common parlance, while Samsung brought even more of us into the age of apps by selling 40m Galaxy S4 smartphones in just six months.

If you were one of handful of Wiltshire residents who invested in the digital currency Bitcoin you could be having a very nice Christmas, but only if you sold at the right time. One coin was worth £6.50 in January and an incredible £650 in late November. With a number of governments looking to close financial loopholes, the Bitcoin bubble appears to have burst, with the borderless digital currency now worth around £300 and falling.

The tablet computer has become an increasingly common sight, with thousands more Wiltshire homes becoming digitally connected thanks to devices like Apple’s iPad and Tesco’s budget HUDL. Tablet devices have overtaken sales of traditional desktop PCs for the first time ever. Many of us long suspected it, but 2013 became the year we finally realised just how closely our digital lives were being monitored by both America’s National Security Agency and the UK’s GCHQ. While I should be outraged about this intrusion into my private life, I find myself more worried about them looking at my eBay auction purchases.

My hands-on experience with ‘wearable technology’ from Google in April was my personal tech highlight of the year. The early preview of the Google Glass offered a tantalising glimpse at where gadgets will take us. The Glass is essentially a head-mounted computer with video camera and tiny screen that you wear like spectacles. Rumour is that Google will release a cheaper, more refined version of the device for consumers in the new year.

My state of perpetual wonderment with the world of technology comes from the fact that visionary creators, and those far more intelligent me, continue to think of new and exciting ways to push our lives forward – technology that eventually has as much effect on the residents of Wiltshire, as it does on the early adopters in Silicon Valley. Here’s to an equally exciting 2014.