If you run a business, you know the importance of face-to-face communication. On the Web, this is a problem, because cyberspace is the ultimate impersonal environment. Humanity Online aims to change that with its virtual personality avatars, which are modeled on real people. If you’ve ever seen Richard Linklater’s Waking Life, you get the idea.

And what can you use these avatars for? They’re aimed at online businesses that want to put a more familiar face on their websites for advertising and marketing. But I’m sure you could use one to pull all sorts of creepy jokes on your friends, too.