This demand is driving associated industries: a talent agency in Japan launched in April that caters exclusively to virtual avatars. The Ibaraki prefectural government created a virtual influencer last month to appear in tourism campaigns, and Kizuna Ai herself was selected by the national tourism board to appear in videos to lure foreign visitors to Japan.
Kao, a Japanese cosmetics and chemicals company, “hired” VTuber Tsukino Mito at a live event in Tokyo to appear on a washing machine’s smart screen to sell laundry detergent. Sugiyama says that as virtual and augmented reality technologies continue to develop, more vloggers and internet users could transform into fantastical and colourful characters – which in turn could become brands themselves. And while there’s no easy way to measure exactly how many VTubers there are, User Local, a Tokyo-based web analytics site, counts at least 2,000. Google’s Earnest Pettie says the amount of daily views of VTuber videos this year is quadruple last year’s figure. He points to Kizuna Ai’s channel as an example of the spike in VTuber popularity: it had around 200,000 subscribers last December, but well over two million just 10 months later. “We saw this start to take off right at the end of 2017… and it’s continued to grow,” says Kevin Allocca, head of culture and trends at YouTube. But in the past year they have had to contend with “VTubers” like Kizuna Ai. Usually, vloggers are people who speak directly into the camera to their fans, sharing things like beauty tips, product reviews and pop culture rants. It’s a movement that has big implications for the future – it could change how brands market their products and how we interact with technology. It’s becoming so popular that one company is investing tens of millions in “virtual talent” and talent agencies are being established to manage these avatars. Kizuna Ai is part of an emerging trend where 3D avatars – rather than humans – are becoming celebrities on YouTube, with dedicated fanbases and corporate deals.
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