ChinaWatch: Sales, Surges, Sayings

Welcome to ChinaWatch, WMB’s digest of news from the country with the world’s second largest economy and our chief rival to global dominance. Our aim is to keep you informed.


What Confucius Says

The newly-appointed 199 Chinese presidents of Confucious Institutes around the world took office this month, according to China's Hanban, the Confucious Institute Headquarters.

The Chinese presidents will work with their foreign counterparts to co-chair the institutes and operate on relevant principles.

Hanban provides them with an employment period of two to four years and requires they have the ability to teach Chinese to foreigners.

The latest statistics from Hanban show there are about 330 Confucius Institutes and 400 Confucius Classrooms in nearly 100 countries worldwide, bridging an important cultural exchange gap between China and other countries.

In 2004, China began establishing Confucious Institutes, nonprofit, public institutions aimed at promoting Chinese language and culture in foreign countries.

Drill, Baby, Drill

High oil prices and a slow-moving global economic recovery are doing little to curb China's appetite for crude oil, a survey finds.

China's oil demand for March was estimated by the Platts news service at 9.2 million barrels per day, a 10.5 percent increase from same time last year.

Calvin Lee, a senior energy writer for Platts, says high energy prices weren't doing much to curb energy consumption in a surging Chinese economy.

“Oil demand in the first quarter was buoyed by diesel consumption due to rising industrial production and increased agricultural demand with the onset of the spring planting season,” he says.

The International Energy Agency notes in a July 2010 report that growth in China has redefined the global energy sector as that nation passed the United States as the world's largest energy consumer.

The IEA says China outpaced U.S. energy consumption by 4 percent in 2009. Exports of Saudi crude to China make up about 50 percent of the kingdom's total exports.

Green With Envy

While Apple's iPhone is selling well across the globe, China has emerged as its fastest growing market for the device.

Apple Chief Operating Officer Tim Cook says that for the first three months of 2011, iPhone sales in “Greater China” grew by almost 250 percent from the same period last year.

This brought Apple's revenues in the first fiscal half to just under $5 billion (U.S.) for the Greater China market, an increase of almost four times from 2010.

The $5 billion generated represents about 10 percent of Apple's revenues, Cook adds. “So we're extremely happy with how we're doing in China,” he says. In the United States, iPhone sales grew by 155 percent.

It's unclear, however, where in China the device is selling the most. Cook's reference to Greater China includes the mainland, Hong Kong and the island of Taiwan, says Apple spokeswoman Carolyn Wu.

But analysts say that in mainland China, Apple is seeing a major shift with how consumers are viewing the iconic smartphone.

When Apple's iPhone 4 launched there in late September, it was a hit with Chinese consumers, quickly selling out and leading to shortages.

Earlier versions of the iPhone had not met with the same reception, says Mark Natkin, managing director for Beijing-based research firm Marbridge Consulting.

Apple didn't officially begin selling the iPhone in mainland China until late 2009, more than two years after it was launched in America.

Even then, the iPhone sold in the country was designed without Wi-Fi capability, in order to comply with Chinese technology regulations at the time.

“Eventually Apple was allowed to offer the iPhone with Wi-Fi functionality,’’ Natkin says. “But by the time they were allowed to do so, the global launch of the iPhone 4 was just some months away. So again many users just waited for the right time.”

ChinaWatch

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Protect Your Personal Info

We all know the need for antispy and antivirus protection for our PCs and laptops, at home and work. But most of us probably haven’t given much thought to our handheld devices, especially smartphones.

It’s scary, but the chances of getting personal information hijacked from your iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, or similar device are far greater, even if you believe the phone is turned off.

It costs only $15 for spyware purchased over the Internet to gain access to your phone and all it contains – text messages, e-mails, photographs and files; and track your location through constant GPS updates.

Your phone can even be turned into a surreptitious microphone. “When the phone is off – in a pocket, purse or on a table – it can remotely be turned on so conversations around the phone can be heard,” says Tim Wilcox, owner of International Investigators Inc., an Indianapolis security firm.

The best defense is to use a handset pass code to lock your phone and prevent others from using it, writes Sid Kirchheimer for AARP Bulletin. And never open links in e-mails sent to you by unknown parties. If you don’t recognize the person’s name or company in the e-mail address, delete it.

For complete privacy, Wilcox says, “Your best defense is to buy a $20 phone with prepaid minutes for your sensitive conversations.”

Even the most innocent of activities can put you and loved ones at risk, notes Dick Eastman, who blogs on computers and genealogy. The security gap has to do with GPS tracking.

“Pictures taken with GPS-equipped digital cameras usually embed the GPS coordinates within each picture,” Eastman says.

“Most cameras have an option to turn this capability on or off, but the default setting usually is ON. Unless you have taken action to specify otherwise, the camera probably is recording the exact location of every picture you take, plus or minus 10 feet to perhaps 50 feet.”

Eastman adds that not all digital cameras are GPS equipped although most smartphones do have both cameras and GPS capabilities. That uploaded digital photo to Facebook of your new car or your kids playing in the yard can provide exact locations.

Not convinced you might have a problem?

Security experts say millions of smartphones already may be infected with spyware, though the risk for basic “dumb” cell phones is far less.

Some Warning Signs

•Your bill may show texts to unknown phone numbers, often occurring at the same time as legitimate calls. It's at these numbers, surreptitiously called by the spyware, that someone is monitoring you.

•The battery is warm when the phone isn't in use, or it dies quickly — this may mean power is being drained by the spyware.

•Your phone flickers when not in use.

Confirming a spyware infection isn't easy. The phone needs to be sent to a lab where experts look for a few lines of identifying programming code.

“With the typical smartphone having up to 300,000 lines, it's finding a needle in a haystack,’’ says Wilcox, whose company charges $2,200 for such jobs.

What We See

WMB's advice is to educate yourself thoroughly on the features of any device you own that contains personal information and, of course, be very careful about what you upload online, especially if it involves an unprotected smartphone.

Today’s fast-evolving technology is a wonderful thing in the right hands; in the wrong hands, it can be a nightmare for unsuspecting consumers.

As the old saying goes, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

 Ken Cocuzzo

Who Let Tech Secret Out?

Apple is well-known for its ability to hold onto technological secrets, but the legendary computer company is suddenly springing leaks. There have been two major security breaches at Apple within the last two weeks.

And these are not just hints of new products but actual prototypes ending up in the laps of major high-tech publishers such as Gizmodo and Taoviet, a Vietnamese high-tech forum. Photos and a video clip of the next generation iPhone (4G) have suddenly fallen into the wrong hands following the gadget blog and Gizmodo’s purchase of a lost prototype last month. It could be that Apple’s long era of secrecy is finally coming to an end.

Major leaks have been virtually unheard of previously at Apple, founded on April 1, 1976, in Cupertino, Calif., by friends Steve Jobs (left), Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne to sell a computer they built in Jobs' parents' garage. Both Gizmodo and Taoviet purchased complete iPhone (4G) handsets, photographed them, recorded video chips and even dismantled them to understand every last component in the devices.

Leaked iPhones command a hefty price, too. Gizmodo purchased the prized gadget for $5,000 and Taoviet reportedly paid $4,000 for its model. Taoviet is currently under investigation to determine if any international laws were broken.
So the real question is why are these gadgets worth so much? And why are high-tech firms willing to part with thousands of dollars to secure the latest prototypes? The simple answer to this is Web site hits and lots of them!

The word on the street is that Gizmodo’s critique of the iPhone (4G) received more than 10 million hits, not to mention brand recognition from major media businesses. A few thousand dollars is actually a bargain compared to the amount of hype and attention derived from such a find.

Blogs, however, are not to blame. Actually consumers are at fault because we have an insatiable appetite to know the latest and greatest details on product information.

Consumers can purchase stock or hardware in anticipation of a major release. Blogs wouldn’t influence their resources on tracking down products from the likes of Apple, Google, Nokia, HP, and Samsung (among the thousands of high-tech firms) if there wasn’t such a huge demand. Consumers’ lust for information continues to grow daily. The main avenues for fueling this need to know anything and everything are frequent use of Google, Wikipedia, Twitter, and a long list of social and information networks as well as a myriad of Web services.

An information deficit is short-lived these days because of our global connection, which is always on regardless of what electronic device we're using.

When we want to know anything, we do a search on Google to find the answer in minutes or even seconds. With Search Engine Optimization (based upon a host of factors including key words), guess work is cut to a minimum. Further, we can find information away from our home by using our smartphone, and our lust for immediate gratification is satisfied.

A new plethora of “real time” Web startups has precipitated our expectations even more. Twitter and Facebook users know exactly what their friends are doing on an ongoing basis. Internet users can receive information about friends’ exact locations, and others can track credit card purchases or phone numbers in real time.

Those accustomed to such instant gratification feel tortured when they are not continually informed and may not know about a person or event.

It’s not that we have a curiosity. It goes beyond that; many consumers feel they have a right to know confidential information. It’s almost like we blame Apple for teasing the consumer about its strategy, and we “should” know what the computer giant is doing, regardless of competition and security issues.

The Internet has conditioned many consumers and daily users to expect the latest and greatest almost instantly anytime or anywhere.

We believe the lesson from Apple’s security breaches is that U.S. companies need to step up protection for their intellectual and strategic planning intentions. If companies like Apple -- a multinational corporation which creates consumer electronics, computer software, and commercial servers -- are to compete, it is incumbent on management to be more security-oriented, specifically in regard to terrorism and espionage.

To do otherwise, with nothing secret, is to court disaster on many levels.

This post is courtesy of TechMan who writes about trends, issues and ideas affecting business, industry, consumers and technology.