Dragon's teeth

Risk of overheating ... uncertainties in the Chinese economy could have damaging consequences for Australia. Illustration: Karl Hilzinger.

Will Australia's dependence on China's growth come at a cost? Some analysts say there are worrying signs.
BHP Billiton's recent stunning financial results announcement - an after-tax profit of more than $22 billion in the year to June, the largest corporate profit ever recorded in Australian history - has skittish investors wondering whether the China story might, in fact, have many more years to run.
At a time of intense financial volatility, with economies in trouble in many countries, such an outcome would be welcome news for our markets.
For it is our fast-growing exports to China, along with that country's decades-long run of good economic growth (see charts, right), that have provided support for our economy over many years.

iPhone hookups go straight with new meet market

He's credited with sparking a sexual revolution in the gay community and now Joel Simkhai thinks he can evolve the way heterosexual people meet each other as well.
Simkhai is the creator of Grindr, a homosexual pickup app for the mobile phone that connects people with others in their immediate vicinity. Launched in 2009, Grindr now has almost three million users around the world including almost 150,000 in Australia, of which 41,500 are in Sydney.

 

Blendr uses smartphone GPS to connect you with people in your immediate vicinity.

Today Simkhai and his now 100-strong team took the wraps off their latest creation, Blendr, which is designed to be used by both gay and straight people to meet others who are nearby and who have similar interests.

Ultrabooks harness the best of tablets to fight Macbook Air

Looks a lot like a Macbook Air ... Acer Aspire S3 Ultrabook.

PC makers have a new weapon in their battle to stop tablets stealing laptop market share and prove Apple doesn't have a monopoly on design: Ultrabooks.
Acer, Asus, Samsung, Lenovo, Toshiba and others have all unveiled plans for new ultraportable Windows 7 laptops that are thinner, lighter, faster and have longer battery life than previous efforts. Acer is the first cab off the rank with new models due out next month starting at $1200.
Ultrabooks is the umbrella term for the new category, which was created by chipmaker Intel to guide vendors with a series of stringent rules.

 

Facebook doubles first-half revenue to $1.5b: source

Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Photo: AFP

Facebook's revenue doubled to $US1.6 billion ($1.5b) in 2011's first half, a source with knowledge of its financials said, underscoring its appeal to advertisers while it grapples with intensifying competition from the likes of Google.
Net income in the first half of 2011 came to almost $US500 million ($469.6m), according to the source, who wished to remain anonymous because privately-held Facebook does not disclose its results.
Facebook's stronger results come as investors have pushed its valuation to roughly $US80 billion ($75.14b) in private markets, with many industry observers expecting the world's No. 1 internet social network to go public in 2012.

Sony unveils $732 wearable 3D personal theatre

A model demonstrates using Sony's head mounted display "Personal 3D Viewer HMZ-T1" at its product launch in Tokyo. Photo: Reuters

Sony says it will start selling a head mounted display that provides a 3D theatre of music videos, movies and games, targeting people who prefer solitary entertainment rather than sitting in front of a TV with family or friends.
Sony said that the 60,000 yen ($732) "HMZ personal 3D viewer" is set to go on sale November 11 in Japan, and is planned for the US and Europe, perhaps in time for Christmas, although dates have not yet been set.
Resembling a futuristic visor, HMZ, which stands for "head mounted display", is worn like chunky goggles-and-earphones in one.

Reporters try Sony's head mounted display. Photo: Reuters

Gaddafi's rocket car

Deposed Libyan dictator once fancied himself as a car designer.
There has been quite a kerfuffle about the expensive cars pulled out of the various Gaddafi family mansions, including a white Lamborghini and, less obviously, a Fiat 500.
But the most interesting vehicle hasn't surfaced: Gaddafi's self-designed ''Rocket''.
Not that the Fiat, a rather bizarre, open-sided electric version, was not interesting. The bright spark who commissioned it - believed to be the Colonel himself - perhaps didn't consider the implications of having no doors in a country that is, broadly speaking, an oven filled with sand.

The man himself. Photo: Reuters.

By one report, the $US130,000 ($122,000) electric Fiat had a separate petrol engine to power the airconditioning, diminishing its environmental gains.

Lure of luxury: does the watch maketh the man?

The world economy may be sitting in a ditch, but cashed-up collectors are still shelling out stratospheric sums for rare, vintage and collectable watches.
This year's top ticket item so far is a 1928 Patek Philippe, which changed hands at auction for a cool SFr3.24 million ($3.81 million). Another wealthy bidder snared a 1942 Rolex for SFr1.04 million ($1.22 million); the highest price the make has ever fetched at auction.
Australia has its share of high-end fanatics - those prepared to spend six figures on limited edition models from the big Swiss brands - and a bombardment of luxury watch advertisements in glossy weekend magazines aims to woo the rest of us.

It's true: your boss is smarter than you

Proven ... your boss is smarter than you are.

Office managers think they're smarter than the rest of the staff and now there is medical evidence to back it up.
According to research from the University of NSW, managing other people at work triggers structural changes in the brain, protecting its memory and learning centre well into old age.
Researchers have identified a link between managerial experience in a person's working life and the integrity and larger size of an individual's hippocampus - the area of the brain responsible for learning and memory - at the age of 80.

Nike releases famed Back to the Future shoe

The 2011 Nike Mag. Photo: AP/Nike

Nike is going back to the future.
The sneaker maker says it has created a limited-edition shoe based on a glowing pair that appeared in the popular 1989 movie Back to the Future II.

 The 2011 Nike Mag is designed to be an exact replica of the fictional sneaker, including a glowing Nike name on the strap. But unlike the movie version, these shoes won't lace themselves.

Nike will release 1500 pairs of the 2011 Nike Mag sneaker for auction on eBay and donate all proceeds to the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's disease research. Fox famously played Marty McFly in the Back to the Future time-travel trilogy, where he wore the shoes during a visit to the year 2015.
"It hasn't gone unnoted by us that there is something special about that shoe and, of course, the movie," said famed Nike shoe designer Tinker Hatfield, who helped design the original shoe and worked on the latest version.

Samsung to Apple: Kubrick made first iPad

The iPad-like devices in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Stanley Kubrick, not Apple, designed the iPad, Samsung says in a bizarre patent defence that cites 2001: A Space Odyssey as an argument for why its copycat tablet shouldn't be pulled from sale in the US.
Even more surprising is the fact that a senior patent lawyer argues that "Samsung probably has a viable defence here".
Apple and Samsung are suing each other all over the world for patent infringement after Apple accused Samsung of "blatant copying" of its products.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 Photo: Supplied

Safe landing: a better way to manage your super

Life plan ... Rose Fox has consolidated her super into one fund. Photo: Quentin Jones

Some super funds are now offering the in-built option of reducing risk as you age, writes John Kavanagh.
The markets have been highly volatile over the past few weeks with big swings on local and overseas shares and fixed interest markets. But what about your super fund? Is it exposed to these risks and should you change your portfolio option to have greater security?
Super fund members should have different attitudes to risk, depending on how old they are and how long they expect to have their money invested before they retire.
The younger you are the more risk you can afford to take. That is because the risky assets are the ones that tend to produce higher returns over time.

But as you get closer to retirement your priorities change.
You start thinking more about capital preservation. Your super fund investment option should have more defensive assets to reflect that.

European bank job 'bloodbath' hits 67,000

UBS’s decision to cut 5 per cent of its workforce brings to more than 40,000 the number of jobs cut by European banks in the past month and to 67,000 this year, as the region’s worsening sovereign debt crisis crimps trading revenue.
UBS, Switzerland’s biggest bank, said yesterday it will eliminate 3500 jobs, mainly from its investment bank. It follows HSBC, which announced 30,000 cuts on August 1, Barclays, which is cutting headcount by 3000, and Royal Bank of Scotland, which is eliminating 2000 posts. Credit Suisse announced 2000 reductions on July 28.
European banks are slashing jobs this year six times faster than their US peers, as concerns about the creditworthiness of Italy, Spain and France roil financial markets and reduce income from fixed-income trading, stock and bond underwriting as well as mergers and acquisitions.

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Financial firms are also cutting costs as regulators force banks to hold more and better quality capital to withstand future shocks.
“It’s a bloodbath, and I expect things to get worse before they get better,” said Jonathan Evans, chairman of executive-search firm Sammons Associates in London. “I cannot see a lot of those who have lost their jobs getting re-employed. Regardless of how good someone is, no one wants to talk about hiring. Life will be very difficult for two or three years.”

Poison at the heart of Greece

'Facing the metrics of doom', Greece is heading for a pyrotechnic default. Photo: AP

The debt-laden country is mired in corruption.
TAVROS is a scruffy suburb in the south-western part of Athens, about five kilometres from the city centre. It is home to the kind of utilitarian office blocks that 1960s town planners thought were a good idea. Many of the buildings are scarred by graffiti and the side streets are strewn with litter.
On a stiflingly hot day, I come here to interview Petros Themelis, a Finance Ministry official, who runs a call centre that's part of the Greek government's battle against tax evaders. The idea is that public-spirited citizens ring up and dob in those they suspect of tax-dodging. This is the human factor in a much bigger war: Greece's life-or-death struggle with the debt beast.
The state's accumulated borrowings are equal to about 160 per cent of national output. Greece cannot afford to service the interest, much less repay the capital. The country is, in effect, insolvent. Without the largesse of outsiders - many billions in bailouts from the International Monetary Fund and the European Union - it would already have collapsed into bankruptcy.

Rich list reveals most cashed up couples

Brazilian beauty Gisele Bundchen and her American footballer husband Tom Brady have seen off Jay-Z and Beyonce Knowles to be named the world's wealthiest celebrity couple.
The mega-rich supermodel and her sports star partner took home a joint income of $US75 million ($72.56 million) in 2010, according to the list compiled by Forbes magazine.
Gisele Bundchen had already been named the highest-earning model in the world for the past three years, boosted by lucrative campaigns with Versace, Dior, True Religion jeans and Ebel watches and a successful shoe line.