I recently got my iPhone 4 and while I don’t really test phones and technological toys like I used to when I was younger, I can still say that it is a marvellous piece of engineering and software but the feature that has impressed me the most is one that I have not read about, and that is that I think the camera has been considerably improved and it has an HDR feature, which allows you to take far better photographs indoors or when the light is poor. 
Sometimes it over-compensates and makes a photograph a little bit too bright, but if you set the camera to HDR, it will take two images – one as it captures it and another by dynamic range image – which would usually lighten dark areas and give you more quality than before.

I certainly don’t have any problems with sending SMS’s and things like that, as I did with my previous iPhone, but I really cannot say that I have tried out all the features! I pretty much survive on a few applications such as that of the New York Times, Twitter and Blumberg as well as the occasional weather report.
 

I really find moaning one of the most irritating habits in the world, and I really don’t have time to be surrounded by too much negativity. A practical example, and I do a little bit of it myself, will be for a few months we complain about how long it has taken for the rain to come, and the second it rains, a robot stops working and we start moaning about the traffic.
It is probably what I would call a small little moan and as long as you are not taking it too seriously, it is fine, but there are those, and you come across them in the working environment especially, who never have a good word to say, who could always do things better if they were doing it themselves, but in reality have no experience of ever running a business, managing anything or getting on with people and invariably the people who have the most to say are in any event disliked by other staff.

I far prefer being surrounded by positive people who accept whatever that day’s problems are and try and work around them and get on with the job. Those people, who never seem to understand why they are so unlucky, because problems follow them from one place to another, just don’t get it - they, and their attitude, is the real problem.
 

As predicted, with European and American economies in somewhat of a state of disaster, retirement ages are already beginning to be hiked upwards. French people are protesting that their retirement ages have been hiked from 60 to 62, and the one thing you can be guaranteed of is in 20 years’ time, their retirement age is not going to be anywhere near 62, its going to be much older.

The bottom line is that all of these countries have been giving too many benefits to their people and spending money they did not have and they are now going to have find a way to decrease benefits while raising taxes – hardly an easy way to make yourself popular as a politician!
 

The European Golf Tour recently has culminated with the Race to Dubai, and that tournament is held at the Jumeirah Golf Estate this weekend. There are a number of South Africans in the tournament, and quite a number who are in the top 10 in the ratings, including Ernie Els, Charl Schwartzel and Louis Oosthuizen, so naturally we will be holding thumbs for one of them!

I am not sure whether it is the hotter weather, or it is just an “end of year syndrome”, but I do find that people’s tempers seem to rise more speedily at this time of the year. In my 15 years of practice we have a disproportionate number of client complaints in the last six weeks of the year, compared to any other time of the year and this pattern repeats itself every year – so much so, that I actually warn my staff about it and tell them to be extra prepared! I would love to know if people conducting business in colder climates have the same issues, so I can narrow it down to whether it is an end of year syndrome or it is the heat – or it is both? I tend to think it is a combination of both, because by early January, most people seem to be way calmer after a two week break!

We get a lot of queries, each and every day, about whether a person has a claim or not in terms of the new Act which came into effect on 1 August 2008. The judgment of the Constitutional Court is expected shortly, and we will then have clarity on most of the issues but if the law remains as it is, the reality is that most people do still have claims but their claims are not economically viable. 

In other words, if they are no longer going to get money for pain and suffering, it really would not make sense to sit filling out forms with an attorney for 2 hours to recover a R50,00 hospital bill or R300,00 in private medical expenses, and so while technically speaking, you still have a claim, you don’t have a worthwhile claim in most instances these days. Serious injuries, in terms of the new Act, involve injuries with an amputation above the knee or the elbow or the loss of an eye and apart from that, generally the only worthwhile cases are loss of support cases, although there will be no claim for pain and suffering, there is still a claim for loss of income. You can read a lot more about claims on my firm’s website at www.accidentclaim.co.za .
 

I love the movie about the founding of Facebook, namely The Social Network. I am not sure anybody comes out of the movie particularly well, but on the other hand they are all in some way or other sympathetically treated, showing what their good points are and what their bad points are. You certainly don’t get the impression that Mark Zuckerberg had an original thought in coming up with Facebook, because the way the movie tells it, there is no doubt that he did not.

In fact, the two brothers who hired him to create a social networking site for Harvard, were paid $75 million each by Facebook to go away with their complaints and the reality is, after they instructed him to come up with a site, he spent about 40 days sending them e-mails with excuses as to why he had not got on to the work yet, before suddenly launching his own site. His own best friend, who had 30% plus of Facebook, was settled for an undisclosed amount, which one presumes is more than $75 million after he had his rights watered down.

The movie though is more than just about Facebook, it is more than just about how Facebook was set up to allow some guys to try and meet more girls, and that is really the point of the whole site, but also about Internet start-ups and all of the excitement that goes with them. What really makes it a great movie is not one’s familiarity with the site and the Internet, but a very good script and fantastic acting. I came out of the movie telling my wife that I really thought that the guy, who acted as Sean Parker, the co-founder of Napster, was exceptional, particularly in the scene when he pretends to be on coke and my wife reminded me that the actor was in fact the singer, Justin Timberlake. I really like Justin, and I don’t know any of his songs, just on the basis of the fact that he is the only pop star with his own PGA golf tournament, and he has a huge interest in golf, but he clearly is an exceptional actor and I would be very disappointed if this movie does not garnish a few awards because it truly is a superb production, a great script and if you have a profile on Facebook, it might well interest you to at least know some of the background, how it was formed and have at least some perspective as to the movie.
Personally, if I was Mark Zuckerberg, and I did not want people to believe the movie, then I would not have, as he did, donated $100 million to charity on the eve of the release – because to me as an attorney, that really comes across as a guilty action.
 

You can imagine my amazement, given that I have blogged a few times about the parking payment machines at Sandton City that I came across one this past week that worked. It even gave me change which is another thing they often don’t do. I did not have to walk 500 metres to find another working machine. I was amazed and thought this was a sign of good things until I got to the exit gate 5 minutes later, and the boom refused to work, indicating that the time on my ticket was exceeded!

I wonder why Liberty simply cannot get these machines working properly. They are busy with a R1 billion improvement of Sandton City with new developments and the like, but somewhere along the line they have to get the basics like parking right.
 

An agreement has been signed with San Parks to build a five star Radisson Blu Hotel in the Kruger Park 10 km from the Malelane Gate. I am sure there would be an outcry from people who don’t want a fancy hotel in the Kruger Park, but I think that the success of the private camps outside the Kruger Park clearly illustrate that there are a lot of people who would like to enjoy the Kruger Park in luxury, and as somebody who has stayed in all the camps in the Kruger Park and has slept well over a 100 nights in the Kruger Park, I would certainly welcome it. The hotel will have a Kids Club, game viewing decks, three swimming pools, a gym and 120 rooms.

I did not think I would enjoy a book about cooking, and I recently loved one, and I have to say that this show about restaurants is quite inspiring. Firstly, when I see Gordon Ramsay, and I think it is on the BBC channel, I realise that I am far too soft a boss because he really does tell the loafers and the waste of time people off.

More frighteningly is that after you see the show, you really realise that if you are cooking fresh ingredients at home in a clean kitchen, you are generally way better off than eating at almost any restaurant. I am sure most of our restaurants are not as terrible as what one sees in this particular show where rats, cockroaches, old food, off food, etc are all regular features, but I cannot help feeling that quite a few are. What I have learned, from watching the show, is that the key to everything is to keep it fresh and the time to start worrying is when a restaurant has too many options on its menu because they, just like attorneys cannot handle many different types of cases, are not good at many different cuisines and if one is trying to cater a little bit for everybody, then it is a restaurant that I certainly would avoid – not that I eat out that much. It is really a case of quality or rather stay at home.
 

www.rottentomatoes.com is my favourite movie review website, and like most things on the Internet, uses the wisdom of a large number of people, to give overall ratings to movies. At the moment, the top ratings are going to the film about the Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg, which is receiving the 97% rating from all critics, but Rotten Tomatoes then breaks this down to top critics and the general audience. 

For example, with some of the more commercial ho-hum mainstream movies, the top critics may give the movie a rating of say 40%, but the general public might give it a high rating of 60%, so it allows you to know while you are not going to a critically acclaimed movie, it may appeal to you on a day when you don’t exactly want mental stimulation! Typically, audience ratings are higher than those of critics. I found the site useful and I generally have a look at it, before deciding whether to go to a movie or not.
 

It is a sign of the tough economy that we find ourselves in that Standard Bank is retrenching some 2 000 staff members. This country already has an extremely high unemployment rate and it is always sad when a company has to retrench staff. We often forget how big the impact is, because it would be very rare that that one person who is retrenched, is supporting just themselves – in most instances they are supporting partners, children and sometimes even relatives, even if it is in a very small way.

The annual golf day of the Law Society takes place today, at the Lost City Golf Course at Sun City. It is certainly not my favourite course, because I think it is way too gimmicky, and with quite a few ridiculous holes, but it is the golf day that got me started in golf and so I do try and take part every year, or certainly when I can. It is only a pity that the Gary Player course is closed at this time of the year, getting ready for the Nedbank Challenge, because it is a far superior course, and one on which I would far rather play.

I have recently been trying to get through to a Doctor at Life Hospital in Fourways. The number of the hospital is (011)-875-1000 and instead of starting with the menu, in terms of the automated voice, that suggests press 1 for the switchboard, press 2 for the ICU, it basically runs you through ICU, medical care and all sorts of options that are not particularly helpful. It is designed incorrectly in the first place, but where the big problem comes in, is when your call actually gets answered by whichever department, because out of about 5 calls I actually only got put through to the doctor’s rooms once. On two occasions, in a row, I was put through to other incoming calls and got to speak with other clients who were phoning in also and we chatted basically about how useless the switchboard was and on two other occasions I was put through to a fax machine!

None of us are perfect, and I certainly have my fair share of complaints about my reception but compared to Life Fourways, I now realise that my switchboard is actually, let alone world-class standards, on another planet! This is a relatively new hospital, and they need to get basics like this right.
 

The KwaZulu-Natal government is circumcising prisoners to reduce the rate of HIV infections. Apparently more than 10,000 circumcisions have been done since the programme started in April and it is well-known that men who are circumcised are less at risk of contracting HIV than those who are not. I think it is a very bold move by government that acknowledges this fact and is trying to do something about HIV in prisons.

The media seems to love negative stories and whether they are trying to fill us with fear everyday as to crime or some or other politician that we should be scared of, and now do it even in sport.

I was really disappointed at the huge noise that was made about Tiger Woods no longer being number one in the world. I think Tiger would be the first to concede that he would be surprised that it never happened earlier as he had a terrible year. But, it is really boring for them to once again bring up details of his personal life and really have a go at him. I know many suggest that it is because he is black, and they cannot accept that the greatest golfer in all history is a black man, and that is certainly one theory, but there is no doubt that there is a large group of people out there who absolutely revel in him having any misfortune.

They don’t write articles that Phil Nickelson, who could have been number one months ago, if he could only finish a tournament decently after being told that he was about to be number one (he has had 12 different chances to become no. 1). Instead, the story could just have easily been written despite his shocking form, most of the contenders to be number one in the world in fact almost had nervous breakdowns every time they were in a position to become number one. Having said that, I do believe that Lee Westwood is the form player of this year and is a worthy number one and if I had to pick someone who really is going to rise even more in the ratings, it is Northern Ireland’s Graham McDowell.
 

Gareth Cliff certainly got a lot of attention out of writing his letter to President Zuma. I thought that while he raised some good points, the letter was unnecessarily rude and a bit too personal. At the end of the day, celebrities of course like to stay in the media with the Idols final culminating, this was a wonderful time for Gareth, who is a judge on the show, to make a statement and get a lot of attention – which he has now received.

Most Golf Clubs have their championships in around March or April, but quite a few have them at around this time of the year, and the Law Society’s golf day at Lost City is next week. It is amazing how something, of no real consequence in one’s life, can become such a major event and how many men, equally competitive in business, become extremely competitive about club championships. At my Club, you get a clerk on your locker for any event that you’ve won, and I still don’t have any clerk, so I will have to keep fighting away!

I am surprised that more resources are not spent on tackling education in South Africa. The system is clearly crumbling, and some schools which may have been disastrous in the past, appear never to have recovered. We will never sort out the various challenges and problems facing this country if we continue to have problems and schools that produce 25 matriculant passes out of 250 pupils, while children have holes in the classroom floor and books are delivered months late.

Sadly, the only thing that the teachers ever seem to be in the news for is either having sex with the pupils or being on strike and we certainly need to focus much more of our priorities, and time, on education in South Africa.
 

Consumer inflation, which reflects the cost of living on a year on year basis, continues to drift lower. In the latest figures, publicised at the end of October, inflation had dropped to 3,2% year on year. I am not so sure that employees around the country will be excited, because obviously the writing is on the wall that increases next year, which always have reference to inflation, are going to be at their lowest ever, but on the other hand, the simple reality is that many things cost less than a year ago, and others have only gone up marginally while overall, businesses continue to suffer and undoubtedly there will be many companies not even paying a bonus this year, and not awarding increases early next year either.

According to the latest Forbes list, Tiger Woods still made more money in the last year, from sport than any other sportsman, coming in at $100 million. Interestingly enough, the second highest earning sportsman was Floyd Mayweather Jr. He earned $65 million and largely because he promotes his own fights, thus retaining much more of the profits from his fights than most boxers would. If he agrees to fight Manny Pacquiao, and if the two can agree on terms for drug testing, his cut from the fight alone would be in excess of $50 million. He sees boxing as the start of something big and clearly has a good brain for business saying that he is not as interested in sponsorship deals as he is interested in shareholdings or ownership.

The Forbes magazine has once again come out with its list of the 400 wealthiest people in America. For the 17th consecutive year it has been topped by Bill Gates who is now worth an estimated $54 billion. In second place, and he has agreed to give away 99% of his wealth to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, is Warren Buffett, the stock exchange investor who runs his business through Berkshire Hathaway and at the age of 80 is now worth $45 billion.

The Google founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin both come in at the 11th spot worth $15 billion. What was striking to me was that quite a lot of the people are not necessarily old money – having had the money passed down to them from their families but in fact have made their money in more recent times, largely on the back of the computer industry.