Photos: Autographs via LongPen

Toronto-based Unotchit has developed a special videoconferencing system that allows authors and celebrities at one location to interact with and send personalized autographs to fans at another. A key feature of the system, called the LongPen Network, is the LongPen kiosk, the video and signature-replication "autopen" that can be placed at bookstores and other retail locations. An author at home, for example, can write comments and his or her signature on a special touchpad connected to the network; those are then replicated by the autopen.