Ryan Pyle for The New York Times Construction workers build a road to a new Samsung facility. Though the Chinese economy continues to expand, construction workers are losing jobs in droves. XI’AN, China — A nationwide real estate downturn, stalling exports and declining consumer confidence have produced what a senior Chinese government expert labeled on Thursday as a “sharp slowdown in the economy.” Though the Chinese economy continues to expand, construction workers are losing jobs in droves and retail sales grew last month at the slowest pace in more than three years. Investments in fixed assets have increased more slowly this year than in any year since 2001. The most striking feature of the slowdown is that it extends beyond the coastal provinces, which depend ... Continue reading →

We’ve known Facebook is serious about photos: Heck, it dropped a cool $1 billion on Instagram, the immensely popular mobile photo sharing app. What we didn’t know, however, is that Facebook was essentially building its own version of a stand-alone mobile photo sharing application, ostensibly to compete with Instagram before it took over the mobile photo sharing world completely. How do I know that? Because Facebook will launch the product this afternoon in Apple’s App Store. It’s called Facebook Camera, and it’s essentially Instagram redux. One, it’s a standalone Facebook application, separate from the Facebook app proper, much like the company’s Facebook Messages app. Facebook Photos product manager Dirk Stoop told me in an interview this morning, it’s an instant portal to one of Facebook’s ... Continue reading →