If Gina Rinehart ever gets her way and wins a spot on the Fairfax board, there's one person she should ring for advice: Ita Buttrose.

Hay is our very own cookbook queen. She's editor-in-chief of her eponymous magazine and has her own line of homewares products, food range and her own lifestyle store. She aims her cookbooks at simple fresh food and has written over 14 of them, but critics call her a stylist not a chef.

David Gonski has only been chairman of the Future Fund for three months but already he's hit real trouble with the fund's surprising determination to invest in tobacco. The value of the fund's tobacco holdings in 12 different cigarette companies is $210 million -- up 40% on a year earlier.

Is the death of Facebook somewhat exaggerated? Or is it one of the great business fallacies of our time? The truth lies more in column A, but there is no doubt that Facebook is struggling to adapt to the perils of a mature, public company.

Rio Tinto chief executive Tom Albanese would never publically admit that his company is a major beneficiary from the current minerals downturn. But between the lines in the latest Rio Tinto profit report you can see enormous long-term benefits for the company coming from the downturn.

The Olympics may soon be over but there’s more fun on the way. In three months time, the NSW Independent Commission Against Corruption will open public hearings into the granting of coal exploration licences in the Bylong valley, north east of Mudgee. And you can guarantee former Labor powerbroker Eddie Obeid will be leading the field.

Although the headlines (and he's appeared in enough of them) read nightclub owner, Hemmes is a clever entrepreneur who's made a bomb out of opening bars and restaurants for Sydney's slick set.

The providore who ensured Australia could savour the best olive oil, chocolates and cheese the world has to offer. Simon Johnson has nine retail stores across Australia, but most of his business is food service and distribution to the nation's top restaurants and gourmet grocers.

James Packer hasn’t yet got the thumbs-up for his Sydney casino and 6-star hotel but he’s certainly doing 100% better than Gina Rinehart in her attempt to control Fairfax Media.

Shewry got his Melbourne restaurant to number 53 on the San Pellegrino Best Restaurants in the World list (now at 63). An avid tweeter and forager, Shewry is a big global player (even if the spotlight doesn't shine on him as much in Oz).