Archive:Video-Enhanced Grave Marker

2010-11-19T12:01:51Z

79.214.100.135: fixed spelling

{{orphan|date=March 2009}}
{{Advert|date=December 2007}}

A '''Video-Enhanced Grave Marker''' ('''VEGM''') is a Western-style [[headstone|tombstone]] equipped with weatherproofed video playback that would be initiated by [[remote control]]. Through sound and video, VEGMs would, in theory, make visits to [[graveyards]] an interactive experience.

This idea is very similar to the 1981 [[science fiction]] short story ''Walpurgisnacht'' by [[Roger Zelazny]], and the foreword in the 1983 collection ''[[Unicorn Variations]]'' mentions an unexpected contemporary invention of a 'talking tombstone'. The 2004 film ''[[The Final Cut (2004 film)|The Final Cut]]'' also features a similar idea, video-enhanced tombstones which play recordings extracted from memory chips implanted in the brain of the departed. [[Rudy Rucker]] has discussed a similar idea which he calls "lifeboxes," - devices that record information about people's lives and can carry on conversations after they die. James Joyce's 1904 novel ''[[Ulysses (novel)|Ulysses]]'' features Mr. Bloom contemplating an audio-only version of such a gravemarker: <blockquote>
"Besides how could you remember everybody? Eyes, walk, voice. Well, the voice, yes: gramophone. Have a gramophone in every grave or keep it in the house. After dinner on a Sunday. Put on poor old greatgrandfather. Kraahraark! Hellohellohello amawfullyglad kraark awfullygladaseeagain hellohello amawf krpthsth. Remind you of the voice like the photograph reminds you of the face. Otherwise you couldn't remember the face after fifteen years, say."
</blockquote>

The VEGM, invented by [[Robert Barrows]] of [[San Mateo, California]], would allow its owner to record messages to be played to loved ones or to any visitor to the site with a [[remote control]]. The stones would be equipped with weatherproofed video playback and recording devices plus [[Computer storage|memory]] systems and a television monitor placed within a weather-proofed, hollowed-out headstone. {{As of|2005|alt=As of May 2005}}, Barrows estimated that the costs of the VEGMs might start at about [[United States dollar|USD$]]8000 to $10,000.

{{US patent|7089495}} was issued on The Video Enhanced Gravemarker on August 8, 2006.
Barrows commented soon after its invention: "I envision being able to walk through a cemetery using a remote control, clicking on graves and what all the people buried there have to say. They can say all the things they didn't have the opportunity or guts to say when they were alive."

To overcome [[noise pollution]] objections, the audio can also be transmitted to wireless headsets, made available by the cemetery's office. Commenting on the threat from [[thief|thieves]] or [[vandalism|vandal]]s Barrows adds "There are very strict laws against vandalizing tombstones, and if you are going to vandalize a tombstone, you'd better hope there are no such things as ghosts."

The issue of censorship would likely be of concern with VEGMs. How high a level of [[free speech]] would be offered to the eventually deceased or [[epitaph]] producer is undecided.

==References==
* Toronto Star: "Ideas of the Week: Talking Tombstones". Toronto: Torstar Publishing. May 8, 2005

==External links==
*[http://www.bookofjoe.com/2005/04/dead_cant_dance.html Video Tombstone: Dead Can't Dance — But They Can Talk]
*[http://www.local6.com/news/4863830/detail.html Company Plans Video-Playing Tombstones]
*[http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1124805949201_120215149/?hub=CanadaAM U.S. firm creating video-playing tombstones]

[[Category:Burial monuments and structures]]

Linux Libertine

2007-12-05T16:46:31Z

79.214.230.191: Added source and information about FontForge, source code, OpenType

'''Linux Libertine''' is a font for computers that is open source and free in the sense of the [[GNU General Public License|GPL]]; it is dual licensed under the [[SIL Open Font License|OFL]]. It belongs to the [http://linuxlibertine.sf.net Libertine Open Fonts Project] that aims at creating free and open type fonts to give users the alternative to commercial fonts like [[Times Roman]]. It is being developed with the free font editor [[FontForge]].<ref>Bruce Byfield (2006): ''Linux Libertine Open Fonts offers free Times Roman alternative'', http://www.linux.com/articles/56565</ref>[[Image:Libertine sample.svg|SVG sample of Linux Libertine|thumb]]

Linux Libertine is a serif proportional font with the look of a 19th century book type, though it has been developed for today usability. It contains more than 2000 characters in [[Unicode]] and therefore supports many different languages of the western [[Latin Alphabet|Latin]], [[Greek Alphabet|Greek]], [[Cyrillic alphabet|Cyrillic]] and [[Hebrew alphabet|Hebrew]] typeset. Additionally it offers several [[Ligature (typography)|ligatures]] (such as ff, fi, ct,..) and has special characters like [[International Phonetic Alphabet|IPA]] characters, arrows, floral symbols, [[Roman numbers]], [[text figures|oldstyle numbers]], [[small capitals]] etc. The implementation of [[OpenType]] allows automatic positioning and substitution like for true fractures, ligatures and [[kerning]].[[Image:LinuxLibertine-2.1.0.png|Image:Libertine sample.svg|Sample text of Linux Libertine|thumb]]
As of 2006, the following faces are available in TTF, OTF and [[Source code]]:
* Regular.
* Bold.
* Italic.
* Bolditalic.
* Underlined.
* Small capitals.

== See also ==
<references/>
* [[Free software Unicode fonts]]
* [[Unicode fonts]]
* [[List of typefaces]]

== External links ==
* [http://linuxlibertine.sf.net official website]

[[Category:Serif typefaces]]
[[Category:Unicode typefaces]]
[[Category:Free software Unicode typefaces]]

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[[it:Linux Libertine]]

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Archive:Video-Enhanced Grave Marker

Linux Libertine