You can talk to an AI “hologram”, but what is it actually doing, and when is it useful?
In this episode of An Hour of Innovation podcast, Vit Lyoshin speaks with Raffi Kryszek, a Chief Product and AI Officer at Proto Hologram, about the technology behind conversational digital people and the practical question of whether a humanlike AI interface helps people get things done. Raffi explains how the company's spatial displays and operating system developed from live remote appearances into a platform that can also present prerecorded experiences, interactive applications, and AI personas. They discuss how a spoken question becomes an answer, why the source of information matters as much as the avatar, and what changes when an assistant appears in a physical space instead of a chat window.
You'll Learn:
* What people are actually seeing when they call something an AI hologram
* How a live remote person, a recording, and a conversational AI persona differ
* Why Proto's operating system matters beyond the display hardware
* How speech input, a language model, a knowledge source, and an avatar work together
* Where digital people are being tried in public help, healthcare, retail, training, events, and advertising
* Why a visible assistant can be easier to find at the moment someone needs help
* How shared holographic displays differ from individual AR or VR experiences
* What questions to ask about data retention, third-party services, model control, and guardrails
* Which future interface ideas Raffi expects, and which remain speculative
Raffi Kryszek is a Chief Product and AI Officer at Proto Hologram, working on holographic displays and the software that brings live people and conversational AI personas into physical spaces. His perspective comes from building and deploying the technology across several kinds of customer settings. His examples help separate a compelling visual demo from an AI interface that solves a real problem, and understand the limits that still matter.
Timestamps
00:00 Introduction
01:22 AI Holograms vs Chatbots
03:11 Proto Holograms: From Presence to AI
05:01 How Hologram Displays Work
08:00 Scaling Holographic Displays
10:40 Live Holograms, Video and AI Avatars
14:35 How Conversational AI Avatars Work
21:08 AI in Healthcare, Retail and Education
26:43 Virtual Try-On and AI Fashion
31:16 Celebrity Holograms and Live Events
33:01 Holograms vs Augmented Reality
37:22 AI Avatar Privacy and Data Security
40:06 AI Guardrails and Enterprise Control
43:34 The Future of Human-AI Interfaces
47:16 AI Agents and Portable Devices
48:37 Haptics, Neural Interfaces and Robotics
51:24 An Optimistic Future for AI
52:56 Innovation Q&A
Connect with Raffi
* Website: https://protohologram.com/
* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/raffi-kryszek
Connect with Vit
* Substack: https://anhourofinnovation.substack.com/
* LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vit-lyoshin/
* X: https://x.com/vitlyoshin
* Website: https://vitlyoshin.com/
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