That's a bit... late to the party. I can't find when the article was published, but the phenomenon "went worldwide" several years ago by the means of COVID. These days the vtubing as an industry is in a somewhat stable state, if not a possible decline, going by viewership hours over the same period. Many big EN and JP names have already retired too.
The stock prices are not great all things considered- I think that the vtuber audience needs something new/different to broaden beyond it's current market base AND I think investors would rather put money into AI related stocks than IP/vtuber related stocks.
The first time I encountered VTubing, I thought the point was just to hide your face, for various reasons. Being sensitive about your looks, not wanting to attract stalkers, whatever. But there's apparently a lot more to it; I was surprised.
I've ran once on some streamer who along with the CGI animation also wears some full body suit of anime girl with helmet, wig. That looked like a blend of two ideas. But that's still nothing new - there were always people on youtube who did fully cover their faces to not be recognized.
That's one reason. Another big one is it's fun to put on a character. It lets you step away from things you don't like about yourself while embracing the things you do
lol the assumptions remind me of the late 90s and early 2000s
where routine benign things such as playing an offline game with a character that didn’t look like you and a different gender was considered to mean something it didn’t, outside of the gaming community
I think this can be very fun, practical amd enjoyable approach for teaching and sharing online techical contents especially presenting to the younger generations, but focusing on the non-AI generated contents.
It can be a very good trade-off between the sloppy AI and the boring lectures.
I can see myself doing this in the future, but why they need agents for VTubing, is it because of VTubing platform, marketing/promotion or payment?
Agencies are helpful for the tech and business side, sure, but as the article mentions, the indie scene has exploded. Plenty of creators are putting out high-quality stuff entirely on their own [1].
So, nothing is stopping you from giving it a shot. People are already looking into using VTubing for education, too. [2]
Moreover, these days as more people experiment with real-world integration and interactive setups, the traditional constraints of being a VTuber are really starting to disappear.
Some VTubers treat it as a gateway into Japanese idol culture. So being part of an agency helps them with access to resources and opportunities for that sort of thing, e.g. voice acting gigs, appearances at events, planning concerts, recording studios, 3d motion tracking studios and brand sponsorships.
Strange omission to talk about the general anti-AI sentiment, while not mentioning that the #3 most-watched English VTuber (Neuro-sama) is an LLM – who is actually widely accepted as a "good" use of AI by other VTubers and viewers.
Does anyone actually believe the premise of Neuro-sama that she is an AI? The original premise was that she is a lightweight AI model livecoded on streams, but that is obviously not the case anymore.
I think neuro-sama has been accepted because she isn't deceptive. It's very clear that Neuro-sama isn't a real person or even really intelligent. The other big reason is that she collaborates with other vtubers and has brought new audiences to them.
Also, arguably nowadays the main streamer is Vedal, her (for lack of a better term) handler. Part of the fun is seeing them interact
I've personally met more women into vtubers as a whole than men. Though, I've met a lot more men who exclusively watch a single vtuber to an almost obsessive degree. This probably has its roots, like most things in the scene, in Japanese idol culture. At least from what I've seen, women are more likely to enjoy the entire experience surrounding the industry instead of just a single idol or group
Also, this completely ignores the small but not insignificant minority of male vtubers
The VTuber phenomenon is often framed as escape hatch for streamers who do not prefer to show faces; IMO, it couldn't have worked if audiences found it disappointing - the audiences must prefer the presenter hiding their face than prominently displaying it. I think that's more noteworthy than the person behind it opting to hide their faces.
I'm not particularly into VTubing (not a fan of social streaming or the japanese style), but i find the tech and creativity amazing. I'm very into mocap and started building an experimental facial capture system, which overlaps a lot with the VTubing concept, but using different protocols (most VTubing models/solutions uses VMC) and more varied custom cartoon models.
If you are into the tech behind mocap this community is a fun place to explore.
The olds always told me some day I would be old myself and would be baffled by what the youngs are into, I think that day has arrived. I haven't hit the "afraid" stage yet but I'm guessing that is coming.
well at least my generation hasn't destroyed the world, so they weren't completely right. Yet?
Some more interesting topics around the subject that I haven't seen covered in the comments:
- Hololive is huge and they definitely take a decent cut for their efforts. But why do people sign with them? The short answer is that they're a well oiled machine where people go through a sign up process where they create a test video etc. If accepted they're placed into groups (such as Hololive English) etc., but at the same time they also get to interact with all the other groups which immediately raises their popularity significantly.
They also look for some other related skills, for example probably all of the English group can sing semi-professionally on a stage etc.
In general your success is pretty much guaranteed once accepted, it just becomes a question of scale.
- Downsides: Usually the vtuber character, name, image and all other related copyrights belong to them. If there are disagreements then you can leave depending on your contract, but you can no longer use that character in any way. For example Nimi Nightmare used to be Fauna in Hololive, but she left and restarted on her own, whereas some other really popular streamers left but never seemed to resurface.
In general they also don't seem to collaborate much with vtubers outside of their space, so I'm sure there are some rules in play there.
A testament to how tech has come along, first you needed complex equipment, then Adobe released a home animator thing which needed a webcam and was paid.
In case you need a real example that's not just gaming or concerts, join me and thousands of others watching Sumo live hosted by MidnightSumo (he's not a cat)
My favorite story about Vtubing was someone explaining what Vtubing was to their older dad. And after some explaining he said "Oh! Like Tool Bear!" He's a youtuber vtuber who reviews and talks about tools.
I'm a Vtuber myself. I'm an indie, self supported, just for fun type rather than someone trying to make a living from it.
If you're genuinely interested in becoming a Vtuber, the barrier to entry is surprisingly low. You don't necessarily need to commission a custom model or a unique character design. You can use one of the VR avatar generators, which is what my avatar is based on, or even start with a modified VR avatar if its license allows it. That's actually a pretty common approach in the indie scene.
As the article mentions, the market is definitely saturated, so I wouldn't go into it expecting to make a lot of money. For what it's worth, a large number of Vtubers don't even meet YouTube's monetization threshold. Personally, I think that's part of what makes the community interesting. I tend to enjoy following smaller creators more than the big agency names.
One thing I'd add is that I think the article overgeneralizes the AI topic a bit and leans more toward wishful thinking. A lot of the hesitation around AI, especially at major agencies, comes from the fact that their character designs are often commissioned from well known artists. That creates a relationship between the performer and the artist, often referred to as the "Mama" or "Papa" relationship, and there can be a lot of sensitivity around how those designs are used. To be fair, those dynamics can show up in plenty of situations besides AI.
If you don't have those constraints, people tend to be much more relaxed about AI. Some creators who rely heavily on fan art are naturally more opinionated about it than others, but it really varies from person to person.
37 comments
[ 2.8 ms ] story [ 67.6 ms ] threadArticle cites stats from Q1 2026, so presumably this is a current view of the phenomenon.
Gawr Gura sang "take me out to the ball game" at a Dodgers game in 2024. This stuff has been super mainstream now for years
https://finance.yahoo.co.jp/quote/5253.T?term=2y
https://finance.yahoo.co.jp/quote/5032.T?term=2y
The stock prices are not great all things considered- I think that the vtuber audience needs something new/different to broaden beyond it's current market base AND I think investors would rather put money into AI related stocks than IP/vtuber related stocks.
Which makes their popularity as organic as the explosion of the K-Pop mania.
How to not be seen
where routine benign things such as playing an offline game with a character that didn’t look like you and a different gender was considered to mean something it didn’t, outside of the gaming community
It can be a very good trade-off between the sloppy AI and the boring lectures.
I can see myself doing this in the future, but why they need agents for VTubing, is it because of VTubing platform, marketing/promotion or payment?
Obligatory VTuber Wikipedia entry [1].
[1] VTuber:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VTuber
So, nothing is stopping you from giving it a shot. People are already looking into using VTubing for education, too. [2]
Moreover, these days as more people experiment with real-world integration and interactive setups, the traditional constraints of being a VTuber are really starting to disappear.
[1]: https://www.moguravr.com/pq-vtuber-live-review/ (ja) [2]: https://steam-library-gov.note.jp/n/nd0907ba91174 (ja)
Also, arguably nowadays the main streamer is Vedal, her (for lack of a better term) handler. Part of the fun is seeing them interact
Also, this completely ignores the small but not insignificant minority of male vtubers
If you are into the tech behind mocap this community is a fun place to explore.
well at least my generation hasn't destroyed the world, so they weren't completely right. Yet?
- Hololive is huge and they definitely take a decent cut for their efforts. But why do people sign with them? The short answer is that they're a well oiled machine where people go through a sign up process where they create a test video etc. If accepted they're placed into groups (such as Hololive English) etc., but at the same time they also get to interact with all the other groups which immediately raises their popularity significantly.
They also look for some other related skills, for example probably all of the English group can sing semi-professionally on a stage etc.
In general your success is pretty much guaranteed once accepted, it just becomes a question of scale.
- Downsides: Usually the vtuber character, name, image and all other related copyrights belong to them. If there are disagreements then you can leave depending on your contract, but you can no longer use that character in any way. For example Nimi Nightmare used to be Fauna in Hololive, but she left and restarted on her own, whereas some other really popular streamers left but never seemed to resurface.
In general they also don't seem to collaborate much with vtubers outside of their space, so I'm sure there are some rules in play there.
And now anyone with a phone https://www.youtube.com/shorts/i2hpLm9CEVU
https://twitch.tv/midnightsumo
If you're genuinely interested in becoming a Vtuber, the barrier to entry is surprisingly low. You don't necessarily need to commission a custom model or a unique character design. You can use one of the VR avatar generators, which is what my avatar is based on, or even start with a modified VR avatar if its license allows it. That's actually a pretty common approach in the indie scene.
As the article mentions, the market is definitely saturated, so I wouldn't go into it expecting to make a lot of money. For what it's worth, a large number of Vtubers don't even meet YouTube's monetization threshold. Personally, I think that's part of what makes the community interesting. I tend to enjoy following smaller creators more than the big agency names.
One thing I'd add is that I think the article overgeneralizes the AI topic a bit and leans more toward wishful thinking. A lot of the hesitation around AI, especially at major agencies, comes from the fact that their character designs are often commissioned from well known artists. That creates a relationship between the performer and the artist, often referred to as the "Mama" or "Papa" relationship, and there can be a lot of sensitivity around how those designs are used. To be fair, those dynamics can show up in plenty of situations besides AI.
If you don't have those constraints, people tend to be much more relaxed about AI. Some creators who rely heavily on fan art are naturally more opinionated about it than others, but it really varies from person to person.