Avatar appearance transformation in a virtual universe

A service for configuring a chameleon avatar within a virtual universe in response to data associated with a target avatar, comprising:

• deploying an engagement determiner within a virtual universe that determines whether an engagement of the chameleon avatar with a target avatar within a region of the virtual universe is indicated, the chameleon avatar having one or more initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances, and determines whether any of the initial chameleon avatar gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed for the indicated engagement with the target avatar within the indicated virtual universe region;
• deploying an avatar attribute analyzer within the virtual universe that reads an attribute from metadata associated with the target avatar or the indicated virtual universe region if the engagement determiner determines that at least one of the initial chameleon avatar gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed for the indicated engagement;
• and
• deploying an avatar morpher within the virtual universe that changes at least one of the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances for the indicated engagement with the target avatar as a function of the read attribute if the engagement determiner determines that at least one of the initial chameleon avatar gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed.

An article of manufacture comprising:

• a computer-readable tangible storage device having computer-readable program code embodied therewith, the program code comprising instructions that, when executed by a computer system, cause the computer system to:
• determine that an engagement of a chameleon avatar with a target avatar within a region of a virtual universe is indicated, the chameleon avatar presenting one or more initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances to other avatars within the virtual universe;
• determine whether any of the initial chameleon avatar gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed for the indicated engagement with the target avatar within the indicated virtual universe region;
• and
• if determined that at least one of the initial chameleon avatar gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed for the indicated engagement with the target avatar within the indicated virtual universe region, read an attribute from metadata associated with the target avatar or the indicated virtual universe region and change at least one of the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances as a function of the read attribute;
• and
• cause the chameleon avatar to engage the target avatar in the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances if determined that none of the appearances should be changed, or in the changed ones of the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances if determined that the at least one of the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed.

A programmable device comprising:

• a processing means;
• a computer-readable memory in communication with the processing means;
• and
• a computer-readable storage medium;
• wherein the processing means, when executing program instructions stored on the computer-readable storage medium via the computer readable memory configures a chameleon avatar within a virtual universe by:
• determining that an engagement of the chameleon avatar with a target avatar within a region of the virtual universe is indicated, the chameleon avatar presenting one or more initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances to other avatars within the virtual universe;
• determining whether any of the presented initial chameleon avatar gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed for the indicated engagement with the target avatar within the indicated virtual universe region;
• if determined that at least one of the initial chameleon avatar gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed for the indicated engagement, reading an attribute from metadata associated with the target avatar or the indicated virtual universe region and changing at least one of the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances as a function of the read attribute;
• and
• causing the chameleon avatar to engage the target avatar in the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances if determined that none of the appearances should be changed, or in the changed ones of the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances if determined that the at least one of the initial gender, ethnic, body dimension and clothing attire appearances should be changed.