This week we continue Crikey’s 15th birthday celebration with another commemorative timeline, this time for 2013.

That was the year the world found out, thanks to whistleblower (and Crikey Person of the Year) Edward Snowden, that the National Security Agency had been illegally spying on American citizens on a mass scale. But although Snowden escaped the grasp of the CIA and sought refuge in Russia, whistleblower Chelsea Manning wasn’t so lucky. For revealing numerous details about the United States’ involvement in Iraq, including the “Collateral Murder” video, Manning was sentenced to 32 years in prison.

Australian Al Jazeera journalist Peter Greste was also imprisoned in 2013 on spurious charges of disseminating false reports to aid and abet the Muslim Brotherhood. Although Greste was freed this year, his colleagues remain behind bars, and their trial is set to recommence soon.

Rupert’s other red-top, Rebekah Brooks, went on trial in 2013 for her part — or not — in the News of the World phone-hacking scandal, which rocked the UK and tabloid journalism the world over.

That was also the year of the Return of KRudd, with Kevin Rudd finally mounting a successful leadership challenge in June of that year. His triumph was short-lived, however, with Rudd losing the federal election to Tony Abbott a few short months later. With Abbott now our raw-onion-eater-in-chief, the dysfunction of the Rudd-Gillard-Rudd years is starting to look downright rosy.