Film critic Roger Ebert, who has battled thyroid cancer for years, has already been poignantly profiled in Esquire (the Wire covered the reaction here). Today, on the Tuesday Oprah Winfrey Show, Ebert touchingly debuted his new, computer-generated voice, tailor-made from his past DVD commentaries.

The moment has left bloggers overcome with emotion. "Too heartbreaking and too heartwarming for words," writes Gabe at Videogum. "There are no words for how awesome this is. Ebert is an amazing human being," gushes ShortFormBlog's Ernie Smith. Generally snarky, even Gawker has earnest coverage. "We give it a heartwarming thumbs up," says Brian Moylan. Meanwhile, TechCrunch's MG Siegler provides technological analysis of the making of Ebert's new voice. "They didn't need a clip of every word he's ever said, just enough so they could reconstruct how he might say a word," he explains. "It's a pretty amazing story about technology."

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