Christmas gadgets past, present and future Now Motorola is owned by Google, neatly illustrating the changes that have reshaped an industry. Computers descended from the Micro are struggling for their very existence in the face of reimagined tablets and touchscreens - and Soda Stream is now so retro it's embarked on a comeback campaign. But the Christmas presents we lusted after in decades past were fundamentally less dominated by technology - today the most asked-for present remains an iPad, usurping the bike as the one thing every child wants. Toys themselves, too, were for much of the 80s and 90s dominated by radio-controlled cars and even if you were really luck a radio-controlled hovercraft. At the beginning of an age when consumer electronics were manufactured en-masse in the Far East, they were relatively expensive, but the stuff that dreams were made on. Present It's the tablet, led by the iPad and Google's Nexus 7, that is the single Christmas present that has attracted the most attention this year. John Lewis say they sold eight a minute - overall, shops claimed a scarcely plausible one every second. And where once these were gadgets for early adopters, now tablets such as Amazon's Kindle Fire HD and the Nexus 7 are just £159, and a very common thing for middle-aged children to get their parents. Where a computer and even email was scary, these devise vanish into the background thanks to their intuiitive interfaces. In fact, although ereaders are still massively popular, it doesn't feel like long until they'll feature in gadgets of Christmas past rather than present. But it's not all about tablets - children who give them to their parents but take no trouble to help get them set up could find the expensive devices are quickly neglected. But toys for younger children too are increasingly all about technology - the remote controlled cars of the past have become remote-controlled helicopters that are controlled through smartphone apps yet cost less than you might think, with the bottom of the range available in outlets such as Toys R Us for less than £30. And even the classic toy gun now has sights to aim and a slot to slide in an iPhone. And for even younger children? What else but a gadget such as the Innotab or LeapPad2, which in a less litigious age might have been marketed as "My first iPad." Future The coming year will see the pace of technological innovation spiral into an even faster cycle - "Ultra HD" televisions that this year cost £22,500 will come down in price dramatically. They might not be under the Christmas tree in 2013, but 2014 and 2015 will see them gaining widespread adoption. The good news is that as the internet becomes even more important to TV viewing, then, more will, like Samsung's current models, feature a slot in the back that will let you upgrade easily so that features for watching TV and for playing games are widely available too. But don't think technology brands are charities - they need their platforms to reach a critical mass too. And while tablets may continue their remarkable growth, it's likely to be mobile phones that look more different in coming years - companies such as Corning and their Gorilla Glass have defined what we have today. But almost unbreakable, flexible phones, such as that demonstrated by Samsung and likely to ship in 2014, will be the mobiles of the future.