Yellow skin seems to have spread far enough to suggest an epidemic of Jaundice, and it would seem that Burger King and the mind of Matt Groening are at the heart of it.

Now before you run out and get a liver biopsy, just take a quick look at www.simpsonizeme.com and you’ll realize what all the excitement is about. Whether it’s merely a gimmick or one of the most genius marketing ploys ever thought of, the allure of creating a two-dimensional avatar seems to have become too much for some people to resist.

“I think it’s kind of cool, and it’s great publicity for the movie,” said Colten Henry, junior mass media major. “It will definitely get people out there to watch the movie.”

A marketing promotion for “The Simpsons Movie,” which opened in theaters July 27, allowed visitors to the site to upload a mugshot of themselves from which it would extrapolate the yellow-skinned equivalent, after which it would allow users to fine-tune the picture through changing various attributes of the avatar including hairstyle, body type and clothing color.

Henry, who heard about the web-gimmick through other people, thought that the initial character created by the computers extrapolation was not that great. However the ability to tweak the character with the plethora of options available was a big plus, he said.

Promotional tool or gem of the Internet, it would seem that people have been drawn to the ability to transform themselves into something mirroring the handiwork of Matt Groening. As “The Simpsons Movie” continues to hit it big at the box office, American has kept finding ways to keep connected with the 18-year-strong sitcom.