Ruby really has had a great year. All us fanboys can now say "I told you so".

Ruby 1.9.2 and Rails 3.0 were great milestones.

Also the community has flourished. We lost _why (sniff) and Zed (don't let the door hit you...) but some great folk really came out of the woodwork to make Rails 3.0 awesome:

Aaron Patterson

Jose Valim

some Carlhuda guy

And a hundred others. I used to enjoy watching the Rails/Merb catfights, but this strong community is so much better to have.