A Song for a New Day (homogenous VR avatars)

The audience demographics varied more than she’d expected: black and brown and white, teenagers and seniors and all ages in between. At the Patent Medicine show, most of the avs had been young and white and had fit into the five basic av body types, since custom bodies cost so much more. She was struck again by how different real people could be.

Pinsker, Sarah. A Song for a New Day (p. 159). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

Her training group all eyed each other, assessing, leaving as much space as possible between their bodies in the small classroom. Rosemary had agonized over what to wear to an in-person training, settling on something not too unlike her Superwally uniform. The others were a little more casual, in jeans or tights and unbranded long-sleeved T-shirts. They all looked scruffy in comparison to the avatars she was used to interacting with. Their colors were off, their hair frizzed. A couple had pox scars on their cheeks or arms. She’d been lucky enough to get through the outbreak with scars only on her torso, hidden beneath her clothes.

Pinsker, Sarah. A Song for a New Day (p. 81). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

She thought he might be around her own age, twenty-four, but he could as easily have been thirty or forty. His avatars didn’t give any clue, since Quality Control were allowed to vary their looks day to day. Everyone else’s avs were set to age thirty-three, an age the company had at some point determined to project the right mix of experience and youthful enthusiasm.

Pinsker, Sarah. A Song for a New Day (p. 16). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition. 

“I’m sure I can find a solution quickly and efficiently. May I have your vendor ID number?” Her words, from her avatar’s mouth. Per company policy, her avatar wore her photographic likeness, but aged up to thirty-three, with neater hair and makeup. She was glad they didn’t care whether she wore makeup in real life, even if they did insist she get dressed in the company uniform every day. They spun that as “look your best to work your best,” but she knew about the tech woven into the fabric, the better to quantify you with, my dear.

Pinsker, Sarah. A Song for a New Day (p. 17). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.