Homunculi

A homunculus is the captured digital emulation of a person, living or dead. Homunculi are not conscious, nor are they “intelligent” in the way that NHP or higher-order non-human minds are; like smart weapons, homunculi are, essentially, specialized Comp/Con units, used in specific contexts where a specific person’s expertise is necessary.
There are two types of homunculi: extant and memorial. Extant homunculi exist alongside the person they have been built to emulate, learning from them as an actor memorizes a script or student studies a text. Extants, owing to their popularity among celebrities, social stars, politicians, and other public figures looking to sell them to fans, have a reputation in the Core and Diaspora as icons of low culture. Despite this association, certain models of extant homunculi are used by scientific, military, and diplomatic missions in areas without broad access to omninet coverage, or areas that have not yet had the omninet extended to them. Their ability to act as a stand-in when specific technical knowledge is needed is invaluable, as is their general utility and specific knowledge in situations where normal comp/ cons would fall short.
The second type of homunculi are memorial homunculi, versions of the homunculus program used to reconstruct an emulation of a deceased person. Popular public use of memorial homunculi is generally confined to museums and personal use (recreating the deceased or temporally misaligned on account of Interstellar travel), but memorial homunculi are also broadly used in situations where specific technical, tactical, or sensitive knowledge is needed. Memorials are crafted using publicly available (and, where access is possible, privately available) profiles, writings, footage, and recordings.
To ensure the most accurate representation possible, subjects with foreknowledge of their memorialization or possible memorialization will often begin recording a profile on an extant homunculi prior to their death.