I have not read the article yet but this immediately makes me much more suspicious of their intentions and odds of success. Solving hard problems like immortality is tricky enough, there is no point throwing in technical constructs which do nothing to advance this goal- unless you believe that having holographic bodies is somehow more important than living forever.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourcommunity/2012/07/human-immortality-could-be-possible-by-2045-say-russian-scientists.html
The nice thing about Russians (I'm from that neighborhood originally) is that they are absolutely crazy and will try just about anything. They also probably have/had second-best science culture behind US (though they suffered significant brain drain as huge numbers of educated Jews left in the last 25 years). They have less regulation and quite a few rich people with ideas. Seems like a worthwhile group to keep in touch with.