It’s the end of 2015. Here’s a quick look back at the year, courtesy of Google. Also: how you can get Inspector Gadget to help you get the kids to bed tomorrow night.

Google reveals what you searched for last year

Trillions. That’s how many searches Google says were made by Canadians in the past year.

The company has listed some of the top trends.

They include:

Canadians

• Justin Trudeau
• Joel Legendre
• Pierre Trudeau
• Mike Babcock
• Drake

News stories

• Blue Jays playoff run
• Federal election
• Pan Am Games
• Paris attacks
• Charlie Hebdo attack

How to

• How to vote
• How to use Snapchat
• How to get new Emojis
• How to download Windows 10
• How to delete U2 album

You can explore other Google search trends from 2015.

Netflix will help you get the kids to bed this New Year’s Eve

Last year, Netflix got some goodwill by giving parents New Year countdowns they could roll out whenever it was time to get the tykes down for the night.

Well, the countdowns are back.

This year, Netflix has created six countdowns featuring characters that are kid favourites:

• Care Bears & Cousins
• Inspector Gadget
• King Julien
• Project Mc2
• Puffin Rock

The sixth countdown has Mr. Peabody and Sherman pulling in Hiccup and Toothless (How to Train Your Dragon), Puss in Boots, the Croods, and Dinotrux to help with the countdown.

The short videos are on-demand, so you can play them whenever you’re kids are ready for bed. Or you’re ready for them to go to bed.

Happy New Year.

Last night, Drex and I talked about the latest exploit by Elon Musk: the successful landing of a Falcon 9 booster after its deployment into space.

We also talked about the origins of NORAD tracking Santa Claus, which is a perennial Christmas Eve thing that started in 1955.

This week, SpaceX proves it is up to the challenge, and how to put an early warning system to good use: searching for Santa Claus

SpaceX returns a rocket to Earth, lands it safely

Elon Musk Tweet from Monday night: “There and back again.”

He was celebrating the successful return and landing of a Falcon 9 rocket that had just deliverd 11 satellites into space.

Musk blogged about the launch beforehand: “We do see lots of movies about space, but, unless you’re watching an IMAX documentary, they vary from slightly wrong, like The Martian (good movie!), to mostly absurdly wrong, like Red Planet (don’t watch this, it will hurt your brain), which also doesn’t help intuition.”

Competing space company Blue Origin was the first to successfully VTOL, but the Falcon 9 used by SpaceX is much larger and traveled much higher.

You can watch a replay of the landing here.

NORAD Santa Tracker

The North American Aerospace Defense Command, also known as NORAD, has been tracking Santa Claus since 1955. The Internet and mobile technology has made it easier, and more fun, for the organization to share the experience with the world.

And it all started because of a typo in a newspaper ad. The story, related in Wikipedia has been verified true by Snopes.com.

NORAD reports on Santa’s delivery progress were originally delivered by radio and as part of television weather reports. But now, kids can stay apprised by visiting the website, or on Facebook and Twitter.

There are also mobile apps for Android, iOS, and Windows 10.

Here’s behind-the-scenes footage of Santa’s test flight from last year. His call sign: Big Red One.

New Homeworld game dated, République continues, more Xbox 360 games come to Xbox One, and a screaming Xbox One bundle becomes available tomorrow.

Deserts of Kharak is the next Homeworld story

The first part of the new Homeworld gaming experience from Vancouver’s Blackbird Interactive arrives on January 20.

Published by Gearbox Software, which purchased the rights to the franchise from THQ, Deserts of Kharak is an origin story about chief science officer Rachel S’jet, who leads an expedition into enemy territory to investigate an anomaly that could be the salvation of the dying planet.

The real-time, tactical strategy game requires players to manage resources and direct the movement and actions of both land and air fleets.

Penultimate episode of République released

Developed by Camouflaj for Android, iOS, OS X, and Windows, the fourth episode of the stealth adventure game République released last week.

The game features Hope, a young woman living in a strange, totalitarian environment. You use the tools of the surveillance state, cameras and mics, to help.

Individual episodes of the game, which is a great exploration of privacy, censorship, and fascism, are $5, or you can get the entire season for $25.

The fifth and final episode will be released in 2016.

Another GTA game gets on iOS

You can now play Liberty City Stories, originally designed for the PlayStation Portable handheld game console, on your iPad or iPhone. The open-world game takes place in Rockstar’s equivalent of New York City, and is about the exploits of mafioso Antonio Cipirani.

More Xbox 360 games can now be played on Xbox One

Last week, another 16 games were released into the Xbox One ecosystem due to the console’s backwards compatibility.

• Braid
• Deus Ex: Human Revolution
• Doritos Crash Course
• Fable III
• Halo: Reach
• Hydro Thunder
• Iron Brigade
• Kane & Lynch 2
• Motocross Madness
• MS.PAC-MAN
• Peggle
• Portal: Still Alive
• Spelunky
• Splosion Man
• Ticket to Ride
• Zuma’s Revenge!

Xbox One bundle for Boxing Day (week)

If you’re looking to get a console for Christmas, either for yourself or for that special someone, Microsoft has revealed a bundle that will be sold starting tomorrow, Dec. 24.

The Boxing Week Bundle is only $399.

Here’s what you get:

• An Xbox One with a 1 TB hard drive
• Gears of War: Ultimate Edition, which includes, for a limited time, the entire Gears of War collection
• Rare Replay, a collection of 30 games all playable on Xbox One
• Rise of the Tomb Raider, the new game featuring Lara Croft
• Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition, the 2013 franchise reboot
• Ori and the Blind Forest

Microsoft is also staging a 17-day sale of Xbox stuff that began yesterday (Dec. 22). They’re calling it Countdown. I wonder what they’re counting down to?

Just a week until Christmas, so Drex and I talked about things you can pick up for stocking stuffers this week.

We also talked about the announcement of the new B.C. Tech Fund, which will inject $100 million into technology start-ups through a venture capital fund.

Also: streaming music and video.