#web talk

[justanotherwebinthemachine]

Sebbo with hardhat profile picture

[welcometomy20s]

April 8, 2023

About a year and a half ago, I and others started noticing there were five agencies which were growing steadily and had plenty of collaboration with each other. I decided to dub them Five English Sisters, emphasizing the sisterhood of the five agencies - PRISM Project, Tsunderia, Project Kawaii, Phase Connect, and CyberLive.

CyberLive was the first to go, but I was not surprised. They were only really included because of the close connection with the other four, and their troubles were easily visible right from the start, or at least that was what I sensed. Even now, long after the demise, the tension has continued, after one of the two talents who moved to Phase Connect, did a bad joke.

Tsunderia had a quiet death, not quite getting the push and pull, first failing to capture the success of Kamiko Kana, although she had other issues, and then success of Miori Celesta. Ultimately they failed at actual support and quietly were disbanded.

Project Kawaii had a ‘miracle’ gen and relatively good models, which led them to great success, and 2nd Gen had a lesser but still remarkable success as well. Things were riding high with the 3D campaign, but cracks were beginning to show with Neena’s departure, which was unfortunate, but then just as things were looking better with the 3rd Gen, Oceane incident was revealed and some time after, whole of 3rd Gen was unceremoniously dropped, which is astounding considering the success of people like Aletta, whose shorts got her to 100K. 

PRISM Project held steady with their four generations and their inclusion to the SONY family cut them off from large success, due to the poor networking skills of the company and the general distrust after the Kaguya Luna debacle, but they have secured security in a way.

Which leaves Phase Connect as the biggest success of the group, which I would have never guessed… I wrote off Phase Connect when Sakana was posting on Reddit about him starting an agency - agency from a reddit user felt like an instant disaster, and the fact that their biggest talent was playing ropes with an even dangerous group signaled me the seal of doom.

But Pippa was one of the sly cookies in the business and the darker tone made the agency stand out, and they managed to successfully float 6 talents in their second gen, which is astounding, considering many agencies fail to float 4 or even 3 talents after their first go. Phase Connect managed to thread the line between the gremlin nature of Nijisanji EN and the outrageous and boastful nature of VShojo, as the alternative of EN Agencies.

While two of the five sisters have fully perished, idol Corp managed to nab the two empty thrones, with the surgical precision of debuting E-sekai in November, during the huge lull in both HoloEN and NijiEN, and focusing on the oft-neglected EU market. Penrose Rin was the snarky British Agency VTuber we expected to see long time ago, and her shorts, reminiscent of Pippa’s short with American autistic anger replaced by British anxiety snark, had garner enormous amount of attention vaulting her to over 250K subscribers in a month or so of the boom, with her fellow quietly but surely tracking to that 100K mark, and most already well over 50K.

But will there be that fifth member? Many had tried, like Amber Glow and AkiroAIR, but they had failed to create a good foundation for a robust fandom. The latest attempt is from Project EIEN, who had a rather nice growth, but no one from the group is a stand-out for the moment.

P.S. - Matori Kakeru’s departure continues to be a major surprise. I wonder if Kakeru is about to upgrade to a better position, because she was having relative success. Considering the Linglan Lily trade, the Taiwan scene has been quite tumultuous so anything is possible.

[justanotherwebinthemachine]

If sebbo was given a knife instead of a spoon she would probably go on a rampage and that's funny to think about

[welcometomy20s]

April 11, 2022

Exploration of Fandoms in Hololive

This is a quick and dirty look at how current Hololive JP members handle their fans. In all, most of the response would be how they handle gachikois. Remember the Pareto principle - gachikoi is the 10% of the audience that generates 90% of the revenue.

Therefore almost always, the balance must be how to cater to an outsized minority while keeping tabs on the majority. Sometimes, you can abandon the cash cows, because you have a big enough audience. Sometimes, you feel easier handling outside.

In those response, Hololive members are split into four categories.

Does Not 'Like' Men - Sora, Miko, Azki, Flare, Marine, Kanata

These are people who are naturally suited for gachikois because they do not like men, or in Sora and Azki's case they don't feel a need to associate with men at this moment. Sora and Azki(?) has collaborated with men before, and so could abandon gachikois, but really they just don't really care. They are idols because they like being idols, and don't feel pressured in that world.

Other four definitely have some 'personal' averance to men. Miko is basically an 8 on the Kinsey scale, Flare also seems to have had a bad history with men in the past, similar to Marine. And I think Kanata hasn't dealt with men much in her life. It is no surprise that these four are quite connected with each other.

Small and Catering - Mel, Akirose, Luna, Iroha

These four work under the Pareto principle I have shown above. Luna is especially fond of this. LuKnights are quite dedicated compared to the streamer, who seems fine enough, but she has a tendency to hold strict to her character (almost reminiscent of Rushia in a way. In fact, Luna might be a well-adjusted Rushia... remember that Luna basically bounced between places [including NIjisanji] before settling in Hololive, so she had her Rushia phase before coming to Hololive)

Mel & Akirose cater mostly because they have to, and if they have the chance, they will likely collaborate with men if they want to.

Small and Quiet - Roboco, Choco

Probably the rarest of groups, where their smallness (read - less than a million subs, because we're talking relative here) actually works the opposite. And the key commonality is APEX. But APEX might not be the cause, but rather the symptom. Choco built her kingdom on two things, ASMR yes, but also outside collabs. Those are mostly female, but she is not afraid to bump into male colleague if such arises.

Large but Cater - Aqua, Shion, Ayame, Pekora, Noel, Lamy, Nene

This is the core of what Hololive makes Hololive. Manji-gumi's biggest selling is the Girlfriend Experience, and they are the ones who are most conscious about it. This is why StartEnd was such a fraught experience, because Aqua had to maneuver her way out. But being surrounded by Suisei & Towa could make her re-think that. But the thing is while Aqua & Towa are Artists, Aqua still relies on idol. What I mean is that the biggest problem for manji-gumi is that they don't have a distinctive (read - low) voice to be an artist like Suisei or Towa. And similar is true for Nene, although I think like Aqua, Nene is starting to re-conceptualize herself.

Of course, my advice is to look at Nijisanji. I advise studying someone like Meiji and Momo, who have a high voice, but nevertheless mostly pursue more of an artist method, Meiji being part of Rain Drops (a mixed group) and Momo's covers being more in accord with Saki than Aqua or Uiha. There might be more that I've missed.

Now for three of the other four, they are definitely not really in the music business. Pekora is a showman more than a singer, her singing is only complementary to her work ethic. She is very conscious of the world around her (something Kiara shares with her oshi) and therefore feels that need to keep people around. Know that Pekora played APEX, but it's clear she is not pursuing a path there, and this is true is other 'worrisome' venture she sometimes partakes in.

Noel and Lamy are very much the experts at catering gachikoi to their long experience in the ASMR industry. They are almost like Sora in that they are comfortable in a mostly male-free space and doesn't feel a need to venture, but they have less of a choice in the matter. But again, since they don't feel a need, there is no problem.

Half & Half - Fubuki, Subaru, Mio, Okayu, Korone, Botan, Polka, Lui

Gamers + Subaru seems heavily anti-gachikoi, but oddly they really do cater more than you first think. It is clear that almost everyone here doesn't need to cater, Botan almost said so, but they are somewhat known for heavy fan interaction and obsessive fandoms. I mean there is literally a horror game about how obsessive Korone's fandom is. So, they are conscious, and in Subaru's case, proud.

But again, they are not dependent. They could definitely survive in a male-accounting environment, even if the income might be smaller. But their model right now goes against that, but of course they do have the freedom and most importantly (the reason they are not in the first category) they have hinted at doing so.

Unicorns Roughly Banished - Suisei, Matsuri, Towa

Maybe Matsuri should be in the above category, but I digress. As I said before Suisei & Towa (one by choice, other by happenstance) are pursuing the Artist route. Not being an idol but being the next Sheena Ringo or Utada Hikaru or more perhaps LiSA, Aimer or AIMYON. Towa was happy that her fans are fine with her interacting with males, but that's not an accommodation, it's that people who are not fine with it left within the first months of Towa's existence.

Strangely enough, probably due to the more public awareness of VTubers, Suisei and Towa have been rising in popularity in 2022. This is the reason why StartEnd was so goddamn big. Suisei, Aqua, Towa are the three Hololive members that are getting hype right now. So the fact that they got hype and they are teaming up together meant massive surge of hype, and is probably the reason VSaikyo got so big as it did. Hopefully there is less hype in S5, if there is one.

Strangely, the success of VSaikyo S4 probably paved part of the way for S5 next year. I think I saw a resurgence of APEX streams from more people in the past few days then weeks before.

But as said before, popular awareness means people who are not catering to a shrinking portion of the population have a better chance of succeeding. The tides of calculus are quickly changing.

Work First - Haato, Watame, Koyori

These were the three I had no idea about, until I saw the name together and realized they are all top streamers in frequency. Haato has been the most frequent streamer until her mental breakdown, and Watame and Koyori frequently battle for first place in terms of streaming time. Their method, therefore is actually outside of the gachikoi meta entirely. They are streamers foremost, and of course all three have a making of an artist as well. But of course, their path is only for a chosen few, I would almost say, for the mad.

The Undecided - La+ and Chloe

And this is where we go to the conclusion. Chloe is very good at curating her audience, but she has ambition of being an artist, she has plans to release an original song every month, this month off so that her next song is full-sized. She wants to be the next Suisei or Towa, but she probably doesn't want to lose what she is good at.

Different problem for La+. Considering her favorite VTubers are Towa and Akane, she wants to be an artist as well, but she probably felt the betrayal of losing gachikoi and worried about her actions causing others to lose theirs. She has deep investment in the current (or perhaps the previous) meta of the industry and definitely wants to keep the good while mitigating the mad. Her outburst seems to lament at her myriad interests. She is young, however. It's understandable. We're living in changing times.

The future could be ever brighter before, with more diversity and more interactions and fun moments, without having to deal with the toxicity of the current internet, but it could just go dark. VTubers are at a crossroads and all the routes carry some risks and some perceived benefits. What road will our tumbleweed tumble?

[welcometomy20s]

April 25, 2022

One of the most important memes in Hololive is that they are supposed to be idols, but they are a bunch of comedians instead. Therefore it would be apt to graph the JP talents into a spectrum going from idol to comedians. Except this would be a misnomer, on both ends. Most music-focused people are not idols but Artists, ironically it’s the people who move away from Girlfriend Experience that are the music producers. And those who are not aren’t necessarily comedians, since comedians require different skills than streamers. There was a Korean show where celebrities and professionals were invited to host a stream, and there was a famous rule of thumb on that show, which was that comedians, in general, were very bad streamers. I think that’s because comedy is mostly scripted, even improv follows scripts. Streaming rarely follows scripts, you have to prepare for the unexpected and you have to fight against mobs of insanity.

So, the true spectrum will go from Entertainers to Artists. Let’s start with Entertainers.

Entertainers

Pekora and Miko are one of the most storied and celebrated pairs in Hololive, and their main commonality is their structure. Pekora and Miko streams almost daily with variety that would enforce the particular worldview of themselves. Music serves to accentuate this worldview rather than making a musical statement.

Others in 3rd Generations also fall into this group. To talk about the current members, Marine is an entertainer that is actually a phenomenal singer, but she’s too frail to actually pursue a musical career and so she settles on odd covers and the yearly original song, which tends to be one of the blockbuster M/Vs from Hololive. Noel is the opposite in that she is a very limited singer, so she doesn’t even do music, other than that one original song. Flare is actually in the lower category, so I’ll talk about it there.

SMOK was originally part of this group, but now only Subaru and Korone are in this group as Mio and Okayu slowly drifted into an utaite. And associates as well with Fubuki, Choco, Luna… Lamy and Botan was originally here, but is slowly drifting into the utaite category as their singing becomes more presentable. 

Oh, La+ seems to be here as well, or least she is trying to be. She probably felt aggrieved during her stay at Re:AcT and so is decidedly working against below.

Utaites

Most JP talents are actually utaites, singing is part of their identity, but it does not define the identity. Since there are many, this group is further separated by frequency.

Light utaites - These include Mel and Matsuri, although Mel has been more active lately. Matsuri could have been an artist, but she seems to refuse that route like many. Iroha is here too, but I think it’s mostly because she is kind of inexperienced.

Medium utaites - There include two of the manji-gumis, Shion and Ayame. By all accounts, she should be light, but compared to her streams, her covers are pretty much on par so just by that she gets into this category. Kanata is somewhat between the two categories, because she has health conditions that keep her from being heavy.

Heavy utaites - Two of the HoloX members, Lui and Koyori, became this, which single-handedly up the cover ranking in much consternation of myself, but also of delight. We never really had this in recent years, other than Polka. Polka straddles between the utaite and artist, considering she has plenty of originals. 

For those mentioned above, Botan will probably end up light, Lamy and Mio in medium, and Okayu firmly lands on the heavy side. Moving on to the artist of Hololive…

Artists

For a supposed idol group, I believe there are only two idols in Hololive, Aqua and Nene, and they both are going through significant reconsiderations. The reason is that VTubers has gone mainstream and idols only really appeal to a specific group of people, which is becoming a smaller part of VTuber watching pie. To grow and mature as a VTuber, it increasingly feels necessary that this idol path is no good anymore. There are straight VTuber idol groups, in fact about half of VTubers before Nijisanji were just straight idol groups like Enogu Group or MaRiNaSu, and most of them still does work, which is fine, most idol group are underground, just because the market is small anyway, but Hololive has become too big to pursue this kind of path without some serious trouble and Artist route seems more more promising these days.

Sora, AZKi, and Roboco somewhat, are not fully idols, but idolic artists. They are like idols in that the branding is a significant part of their appeal, but the brand is a bit different from celebration of femininity. They pretty much bred from the initial model, that of Kizuna Ai. As people would state, Kizuna is much more of a brand than a talent. But she is not quite an idol, because there is underlying maturity in her, which is also present in Sora, AZKi and Roboco. So they operate on these grounds. They also kind of act solo, collabs being few and rare. It’s hard to say what they are specifically.

Some who are easier to calibrate are those who are straight artists like Suisei and Towa. They put out lots of covers and originals, and most of their days are spent in producing music, that is not to say they are not skilled streamers, but most people support in their pursuit for a musical career. There are more in this vein, like Watame.

Watame is probably not the first person you think of as a Hololive Artist, but she definitely is one, it’s just that she also streams for 8 hours a day, and that overshadows her musical talent, which is plenty. Others are overshadowed for other reasons, like Akirose, who is just not popular enough (for whatever reason), and Chloe whose memes kind of avoided her musical talent lately. I once again mention that Chloe has been writing an original song every month with a break this month to produce a full song next month. This part rarely gets mentioned because it goes against the PON.

[welcometomy20s]

June 30, 2021

Coco (and Lulu’s) Legacy

Coco wrote the book on how to be a Hololive member, from front to back. She plotted out how one can amass an audience, how to interact and build a worldwide fandom, how to integrate ideas of the audience to the grand narrative of the company, how to deal with tee-tee and pairings, how to cope when YouTube strikes you down in its impunity, and how to cope when Cancel Brigade comes to destroy your work, along with how to bring a more cohesive workplace, how to protect yourself from the unmooring of identity that is inherent in VTube, and finally how to leave when you are in a rollercoaster that is only going up. Coco wrote the book and now we follow.

AsaCoco was brilliant from its outset. Having a place to know the ins and outs of various members of Hololive was a great way to connect the rabbit hole. But there is a deeper reason for the brilliance. I talked before about how the major tension in VTube is one between the corporate back-end tradition of Japan colliding with the audience front-end tradition of YouTube. AsaCoco is something directly in line with that second tradition. The visual language of YouTube is different from those of movies. A jump cut in a movie denotes a different idea than a jump cut on YouTube. Movie critic complaining about jump cuts in vlogs is like a Spanish reader complaining about a sentence in English being awkward. Of course it is, it’s in a different language. Unlike movies, which come from theatre and literature, vlogs’ lineage comes from news broadcasts. Many of the early web successes were styled in a news format (rocketboom, Ze Frank, What the Buck and so on…) One does not complain about the jump cut between different presenters in a newscast, and so one does not complain when a similar thing happens in vlogs. But the point is that AsaCoco harkens to the audience-based tradition.

One might write off the ARK arc as an aberration, but I think ARK did add something constructive to Hololive and VTubers as a whole. I like to think of ARK as a training wheel for Minecraft. Minecraft is relatively challenging compared to ARK. Minecraft speedruns are mildly impressive, ARK speedrun less so. ARK is actually like the middle ground between Monster Hunter and Minecraft. You can play ARK like Monster Hunter, gather a bunch of friends to hunt monsters, or like Minecraft, build your own zoo or house or so on… And in that flexibility, one can easily learn how to tell a compelling narrative in an open-world setting. Pekora’s war criminal tendencies developed there, Miko’s ‘pon’ nature was crystalized there, and so on…

Holohouse was an underrated achievement. At first, the idea feels like the natural extension of their idol nature. Idols live together, so why not virtual idols? But having virtual idols living together comes with additional benefits that Nijisanji should note.

Stalking is an awful thing, I know since I experienced and have done something similar in my past, but stalking is also a desperate thing. And desperation tends to abate when people are more open about themselves. One of the articles talking about Coco’s graduation infamously notes the mystery of Coco’s identity, which is chucklesome since Coco’s identity might be the most open secret in all of Hololive. This was in line with Hololive’s more open policy, several of Hololive members do their own personal work on the side, while in many early companies, this was forbidden. Nijisanji’s background is less open than Hololive, perhaps due to the number and less mass attention, and that leads to stalking being a more adventurous one. One that livers have to deal with more alone, while for Hololive, it’s likely people would catch and perhaps even tar the perpetrator. More attention means more risk with less excitement.

Holohouse also protects aggressive fan behavior by introducing VTuber solidarity. With more offline collabs, the people would know each other more personally and therefore have a ground of contacts in which to alert suspicious behavior. Safety in numbers.

Holohouse also brought us KanaCoco, which was a lesser known pairing until the couple ring story, and now it has become one of three big couples of Hololive, the other two being NoeFlare and OkaKoro. The big three all have a different style of their tee tee. KanaCoco is the type of a longtime buddy. Both Kanata and Coco struggled with familial and economic circumstances, and they are both struggling under the same roof. And within that struggle comes comity and friendship. It’s not love in your typical sense, but it is a type that would lead to marriage and childrens… but the current LBGTQ+ status in Japan is pretty bad, so tee tee and hush hush it is.

In a sense, KanaCoco provides for an excellent cover. It is one of the most inspiring portrayals of woman-woman friendships in media and it would be one of the more enduring aspect of Coco’s legacy as it passes down through the generations.

[Note: This somehow became an apologia of the past week. Well, I do like to show my thinking with my behavior, perhaps to my detriment, so… just be warned.]

For the past week, I was hyping about the fact that Gura passed Kizuna Ai to become the most-subscribed VTuber. And I made the point, not through immaturity, but because I realized this coincided with Coco’s graduation. Without Coco, there wouldn’t be Hololive English, or Gawr Gura, and therefore this event would not have happened. This, therefore, was one of the last great accomplishments of Coco. An indelible mark of her foresight and perseverance. A realization of her plans. So, in a sense, this was one of my ways of celebrating Coco’s career, albeit in an admittedly twisted way.

But beyond Hololive English, there was the famous Meme Review, which has a weak lineage with the early meme review series from PewDiePie. Now for the digression, whoever ends up at the top gives us a flavor for that specific era, since one naturally assumes success means finesse and would try to emulate the style. Vlogbrother’s visual style and mannerism was largely lifted from Ze Frank. PBS Idea Channel famously emulated Ray William Johnson’s background to his own ends. And Kizuna Ai was famously inspired by PewDiePie at several points in her career. Which is why PewDiePie’s Congratulations felt right as a tribute. One of the big shared characteristics of the two was the lonely years at the top. PewDiePie is probably going to be longest reigning ‘King’ of YouTube for a while (of course, depends on if Cocomelon catches T-Series in due time) and at the time his reign was abnormally long. Most people hold onto the top spot for a year or two, so it felt odd that PewDiePie was untouchable for so long. Similar things must have been raised for Kizuna Ai as well. Many people must have felt that Kizuna Ai just did not represent VTubers at the current time.

So, when competition showed up, of course people were excited. It felt like it was time. I believe PewDiePie’s Congratulations was not a simple diss track, although it’s formatted like one, just due to the culture at the time. So the hypothetical Kizuna Ai version would be extremely light-hearted. The ‘diss’ would be your typical “she’s short”, “she’s hydrodynamic” and so on… it would be clear there is no actual bad blood, and the song would be welcoming of the new era. Era, as I said before, brought on by Coco.

Back to the Meme Review, meme review was great as it centered reddit as the base for the fandom, rather than twitter, which is a horrible platform to bring a sense of communal welcomeness. Reddit is probably the best functional place for stuff like this, even though we all know it has its host of problems that needs to be resolved.

What is the most important stream in Hololive? Well, some people would point to Aqua and Coco’s The Raft stream, which is a poignant encapsulation of a stream. The dramatic counterweight to the other greatest stream in Hololive, Korone’s all-english Mario stream. Aqua and Coco are always the odd pairing, but it could have worked, and it might have been beneficial. Aqua is one of the most shy people in Hololive, and Mio is already busy with Ayame and Subaru, so the best person might have been Coco.

But China. There were two big beneficiaries from China in Hololive, one was Fubuki and the other was Aqua. While Fubuki, in Coco’s last months, famously went out of her way to intertwine herself with Coco to directly redirect her audience, like the mensch she is, Aqua always struggled with her audience retention, therefore played shy with Coco.

Edit: Well, my initial final impression was… what a wonderful finish. The interview portion was well-meant, but honestly a little formal. When the 4th Gen went together, is when the stream turned into something special for me, and the final performance was actually really well-done. Coco went out like an idol, which makes sense. For whatever provocation Coco perpetuated, Coco only did them out of love. And ultimately Cover knew that. Coco’s final month was a warning and a reminder.

Can I talk about all the different tributes lately? In some sense, Usaken Summer Festival is part of this… for an organization that is immensely popular, I just adore how Cover and their talent always has this drive to throw everything and see if it works. I noticed this during Golden Week. Golden Week in Hololive was jam packed. There were great events, Mio’s morning stream was astounding, leading to one of biggest growth spurt for Mio. Miko’s drawing collab was absolutely hilarious, for such a simple and seemingly hastily put idea. One of the people in a forum commented on this and affixed something that left my mind… what did Nijisanji during the same week? Even I was surprised by how little Nijisanji did that Golden week. They barely did anything!

The innovative spirit does give them trouble, more than it is worth, but Cover never really stopped its momentum, even when most other companies would have stopped a long time ago! This is the greatest thing about Hololive and Cover, the most redeeming feature. One that would serve them well. Coco wrote the playing book, let us pray that Cover sticks to them, because the fall of Cover comes the moment they stray.

The Pre-Coco era was about a company struggling to get their idea through. The Coco era was about writing the playing book. So the Post-Coco era will be about remembrance, it’ll be a struggle to keep the memory of what the playing book is. It’ll be about them being Hololive as they become part of the global zeitgeist.

[welcometomy20s]

October 27, 2021

Millie’s Collab Ban makes me worried.

Primer is that Mille was supposed on a DnD campaign with Reza and she got denied. While the facts of the case seem pretty routine, this event crystalized my fears.

My experience with Ethyria was the exact opposite of the kind with HoloCouncil. When I first saw the PV for the Council, I felt that this was way out of line with Hololive and that, as they do, they bit too much and Council might become isolated… but by the time they were basically hired as busibodies to build the EN side of the Portal, I was convinced they were very good hires, and that Hololive did a great job with integration.

There was something special in that really only game that all of HoloCouncil enjoyed was Minecraft, in that Minecraft always kind of been the hub of Hololive happenings. And Council shenanigans basically cemented that fact. It also made for a really quick integration with JP members as well, because EN effectively now shares a place with JP, in a sense. Meanwhile, ID has been more separate, which actually works a bit, since there is a feeling that ID members might become assimilated too much locally.

Compared to this upward spiral, Ethyria has gotten a downward shift. Nijisanji was very cautious about EN. While Hololive tends to go all in on experiments, Nijisanji is usually very considerate. ID and KR was a curious approach, and while Hana ensured ID’s survival… KR was doing just enough that ANYCOLOR went autopilot, putting out new people because it’s their thing more than giving actual interest.

But EN and Koshien changed things. Nijisanji made the bold move of tapping people straight from the thicket of the booming indie EN scene, instead of picking people around that hubbub as in Hololive’s strategy, which meant they were met with people with a different mindset, one who makes their bread with collabs and generally throwing meme at people. I guess ID should have been their vaccine, but EN is more fearless about doing this to anyone around them. But these fears were almost secondary.

As I wrote before, Nijisanji did not only fear EN will go kaput, as IN did, but that they will overshadow their main branch, similar to HoloMyth’s rise in fall of 2020. While HoloMyth was basically the one shining light, in midst of many problems happening around the same time, Nijisanji didn’t need light, they were already doing fine for themselves. And a takeover would be more of a nuisance than a godsend. But LazuLight was as good as HoloMyth (I should talk about how Pomu essentially rebranded herself and yet not only she was able to thrive in the environment, but her prior friendship only strengthened) and they were big, but not too big, exactly in the goldilock zone ANYCOLOR wanted.

So, they quickly put on OBSYDIA, which worked out fine, a little less, but still big and distinctive, with Selen’s off-road ways paying off big time, almost akin to Mito. And held a second audition, with a special section for male VTubers.

Then came Koshien. The decision was logistical, which was why I was able to predict it. There weren't enough JP members to fill 8 teams, but adding ID/KR/EN would have worked. But the knock-on effect was not anticipated. Belmond ‘swatch-along stream was the beginning of the promise long held by viewers. Nijisanji becoming a truly international affair. Something ANYCOLOR was wary about, but had to come to face that it was inevitable in the face of success regarding EN and Koshien.

The result has been mixed. JP members have mostly aligned with KR members, which meant that ANYCOLOR now had to actually care about KR as a whole, also the fact that the VTuber boom finally arrived in Korea after so long. The key landmark was the opening of NijiArk overseas. This moment would probably mirror the opening of HoloSaba to ID members. And Nagi’s yandere moment to Ange would be their ‘lapis lazuli’ in regards to PekoMoona and the Construction Arc that followed them.

And that’s the state of Nijisanji when Ethyria arrived. Ethyria was an extension of what they were doing previously. In the end, they basically hired a chunk of the indie EN VTuber scene, and transplanted them to a Nijisanji setting. Which is why I felt something was off during the first few streams… apparently ANYCOLOR did not know that was what they did when they hired the four livers, and they started to believe that they might have gotten too greedy. It wasn’t like they hired someone big before, in the form of honorary KR member Chigusa, but Chigusa came from a 1st gen company, while Millie and the rest came from the indie EN/SEA scene, which is very different.

Much like Rosemi carelessly eating the spicy hot noodles from her 100K stream, they did not realize how spicy they were ordering and are now doing haphazard damage control, which would only serve to destroy creativity and comity in Nijisanji EN.

Ninisani joke is very funny, but it’s very much a shadow of the fact that they are in a different place to what Nijisanji expect from their livers. Mille’s Collab Ban stroked old fears when Millie’s past life decided to retire and everyone knew she was going to a new place very soon, and that it was probably Nijisanji. Millie is known to be a fangirl and impresario to many people around her, and that was her greatest strength. Millie is great on her own, but she truly shines when she is with others. Nijisanji would probably limit her in terms of collabs and interactions, would that hurt her or can she overcome it?

The answer seems to be more negative by the day, and I feel worried for them.