Culture

Xbox Live avatars of the not-so-rich-and-famous

Pictures of real-life people plus their virtual doppelgangers produced with the new Xbox avatar system.

Dan Ackerman Editorial Director / Computers and Gaming

Dan Ackerman leads CNET's coverage of computers and gaming hardware. A New York native and former radio DJ, he's also a regular TV talking head and the author of "The Tetris Effect" (Hachette/PublicAffairs), a non-fiction gaming and business history book that has earned rave reviews from the New York Times, Fortune, LA Review of Books, and many other publications. "Upends the standard Silicon Valley, Steve Jobs/Mark Zuckerberg technology-creation myth... the story shines." -- The New York Times

Expertise I've been testing and reviewing computer and gaming hardware for over 20 years, covering every console launch since the Dreamcast and every MacBook...ever. Credentials

Author of the award-winning, NY Times-reviewed nonfiction book The Tetris Effect; Longtime consumer technology expert for CBS Mornings

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Dan Ackerman

Nov. 21, 2008 12:59 p.m. PT

The guys at one of our favorite video game blogs, Joystiq, have put together a gallery of what they call "NXE Avatars of the Rich and Famous." The NXE stands for New Xbox Experience, also known as the big new dashboard update for the console, which we previewed this week. The gallery takes pictures of real-life people and contrasts them with virtual doppelgangers produced with the new Xbox avatar system.

We assume the gallery was put together with tongue firmly in cheek, since the people profiled would be totally unknown outside of the relatively cloistered world of the video game industry. To show you just how far down the ladder they went, even I was included.