Gold

7:44 PM

 
 

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via The Big Picture on 1/20/10

Sought after since the beginning of recorded history, gold remains a highly valued metal, reaching record highs recently, climbing over 135% in value in the past year alone. The recent rise in the price of gold comes just as annual worldwide mine production has decreased - down by nearly 8% since 2001. In human history, only 161,000 tons of gold have been mined - more than half of that extracted in just the past 50 years. Collected here are a handful of recent photographs of people searching for, mining, rediscovering, celebrating, buying and selling gold. (37 photos total)

A visitor touches the world's largest solid gold brick weighing 220kg (worth over US $7.8 million at today's price), at the Jinguashi Gold Museum in Ruifang, Taipei county, on December 2, 2009. (SAM YEH/AFP/Getty Images)


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Faces of Haiti

7:43 PM

 
 

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via The Big Picture on 1/22/10

Ten days after the massive earthquake in Haiti, some 80,000 of the estimated 200,000 dead have been buried, two million residents now find themselves homeless, and hundreds of thousands of them are now trying to flee the capital city. Rescue crews are beginning to abandon hope of finding any further survivors in the rubble - the last person to be pulled out alive was on was rescued on Wednesday, the 20th. Aid agencies are still ramping up their efforts - the Red Cross alone has deployed what it calls its greatest deployment of emergency responders in its 91-year history. Collected here are some closer looks into recent events in Haiti, seen through the faces of the survivors and the recently-arrived security, rescue and care workers [ Also see earlier entries: 1, 2, 3]. (46 photos total)

A Haitian man washes the face of his wounded family member as he is treated at the Israeli army hospital on January 18, 2010 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. (Uriel Sinai/Getty Images)


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At work, part II

7:43 PM

 
 

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via The Big Picture on 1/25/10

Although the global economic downturn no longer appears to be heading off a cliff, signs of stability or recovery are still sporadic and tenuous. As news stories look for signs of of the direction of economic indicators, photographs fill the wires of people working from all over. Once more, I've collected some of these disparate photos over the past couple of months, composing another global portrait we humans at work around the world. [see also At Work - 02/09] (45 photos total)

A worker rotates a gas turbine during assembly at the Siemens gas turbine factory on January 8, 2010 in Berlin, Germany. (Sean Gallup/Getty Images)


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Firefox 3.6 Release Candidate 2 Available for Download [Downloads]

8:29 AM

 
 

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via Lifehacker by Kevin Purdy on 1/18/10

Windows/Mac/Linux: There's actually nothing new for Windows and Mac users, but if you're a Linux Firefox user who likes the cutting edge, or just like to be up-to-date, the second release candidate of Firefox 3.6 is available for download.

The main update, as the Firefox Extension Guru puts it, is a fix to a JavaScript bug in the Linux build of Firefox 3.6 release candidate, which is fixed in this second release. Otherwise, Windows and Mac users get a quick re-build of the web browser, along with some reassurance that Firefox 3.6 is moving along on schedule, due to officially release on January 26.

Like previous 3.6 releases, this build does include no-restart-needed Personas theme capabilities, add-on and plug-in security updates, improved rendering, JavaScript, and startup performance, and better support for the game-changing HTML5 specifications. If you're using extensions that haven't updated yet and you want to keep on-board, you can make them work with Firefox 3.6.

Firefox 3.6 Release Candidate 2 is a free download for Windows, Mac, and Linux systems.

Firefox 3.6 RC2 [Mozilla]



 
 

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Haiti six days later

8:23 AM

 
 

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via The Big Picture on 1/18/10

Haiti remains a place of profound need, anguish, desperation and danger, with a few glimmers of hope and slowly growing capabilities to receive and distribute the international aid now flowing in. Sporadic looting, sometimes violent, was met with force by security oficials and ordinary citizens, resulting in a number of further deaths and injuries. The tenuous security situation has led to at least one temporary evacuation of a medical facility, to protect the care-givers. Despite the long time since the earthquake, at least five people were pulled from the rubble alive this weekend, including a young girl trapped inside a supermarket who was fortunately surrounded by food, and survived on fruit snacks. (38 photos total)

People run toward a U.S. helicopter as it makes a water drop near a country club used as a forward operating base for the U.S. 82nd Airborne Division in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Saturday, Jan. 16, 2010. Relief groups and officials are focused on moving aid flowing into Haiti to survivors of the powerful earthquake that hit the country on Tuesday. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)


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Fire and Ice

4:48 PM

 
 

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via The Big Picture on 1/15/10

For today's entry, an exercise in contrasts: Fire and Ice. Fire can be a life-sustaining, constructive element, or, at worst, a powerfully destructive force - something we humans continue to use, play with, and struggle to control. Ice is closer to the natural state of the universe, cold, still and lifeless. Earth's orbit lies in a "Goldilocks zone" where we may seasonally experience icy environments, but never freeze completely. Collected here are several recent alternating photographs from around the world of both Fire and Ice. (40 photos total)

Members of the public enjoy a late afternoon walk on the frozen Lake of Menteith, on January 4, 2010 in Scotland. (Jeff J Mitchell/Getty Images)


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