Influencers are people who plug products on their Instagram/YouTube/Twitter pages. They're the TV pitchmen of this century. Now that real humans are no longer required for this task, we can say we've finally reached a point where the archetypal "soulless corporate automation" can be an actual soulless corporate automation.

But it doesn't matter that the fake digital personas are not "perfect" and has an "uncanny valley" look to them.

There's various research[2] that says that avatars with "eye contact" or "eye gaze" helps some children learn better. It seems plausible that avatars can also affect mood of customer service interactions or advertising.

If one looks at their technology page[3], it's like taking the Unreal Engine for synthesizing facial expressions combined with A.I. for understanding speech and responding in natural language. I.e. It's like adding a realtime digital face with emotional affectations to Apple Siri or Amazon Alexa.

[1] deep link: https://youtu.be/Vh9msqaoJZw?t=194

[2] https://www.google.com/search?q=avatars+virtual+teacher+lear...

[3] https://www.soulmachines.com/technology/

Is this performance art or did somebody just screw up the title tag?

my guess is that the plan is to hang on and hope that technology will appear that they can use, and that money will appear to allow them to dominate.

they better have very deep pockets, and a lot of patience.

Credulous VCs deserve the ride they’re being taken on