A colleague explained it to me like this:

"During a recession, all the big companies will tighten their budgets and not throw money to copy your products"

They then pointed out that all the companies that took off in the 10s started during the 2008 recession.

Look at what happened to Snapchat for an example of what happens when other companies have money to spend to catch up with your product quickly.

2008 was also when the iPhone SDK unleashed massive opportunity.