This BBC article, which starts breathlessly, "Hollywood is on the verge of breaking into an entirely new virtual world", really isn't all that surprising; Arthur C. Clarke was writing about "synthetic thespians" over 20 years ago.

Though why not start with musicians first? The MTV/YouTube small-screen format has to be a lot more visually forgiving than a 40-feet movie screen, and an all digital, all synthetic singer seems like a logical progression from today's formula pop stars, as I wrote four years ago for Tech Central Station.