Goodbye, trip love
"Hello, Hello, even if there is only one person, I will find the answer at some point."
The lights came on, and wearing a white dress, he stepped off the colorful platform and sang his famous song "Morning Call".
As one of the world's first and most successful Youtubers, Trippick has been featured on TV titles, and her endorsement ads have been spread across countless street screens. At this time, there was only one person on the empty stage, and under the gaze of more than 20 million fans on YouTube and B station, Tripeie began her last concert.
The announcement of farewell does not seem to have had much impact on the virtual anchor industry: clicking on the virtual anchor area of Station B, Vup is still live broadcasting and contributing; lehua Entertainment, which launched the virtual group A-Soul, has the latest recruitment list in February, and there are also virtual idol content choreographers, dynamic capture face capture engineers, character modelers, middle people and other professions related to virtual anchors. Almost every week, there will be a new virtual main broadcast channel, joining the industry that is still thriving.
At a time when the metacosm has become the focus of public attention, virtual anchors that combine "virtual" and "real" have also become hot spots for investment. According to the "2021 China Virtual Idol Industry Development and Netizen Investigation and Research Report" released by Ai Media Consulting, the scale of China's virtual idol industry will reach 12.08 billion yuan in 2022, driving the industrial scale to 186.61 billion yuan. And the industry has strong continuity, and will maintain a stable growth trend for a period of time in the future.
A blank canvas
"Hi Domo! I'm a virtual Vtuber Kizuna AI! ”
Passionate, energetic, and energetic, this is the first impression of Trip Love – wearing a formula suit with pink and white as the main colors, wearing a pink hairpin that will gently shake her movements, always using "Hello everyone!" "As the opening statement of the video.
"It's different from ordinary YouTubers, oh ~ you who think like this, your eyes are very sharp!" In her first self-introduction video released in December 2016, Trippick introduces her identity: Virtual Youtuber (hereinafter referred to as Vtuber) between "two-dimensional" and "three-dimensional". As the world's first Vtuber, Trip Love is also known as the "First Emperor of Virtual Live Broadcasting".
The love of becoming the first Vtuber is inseparable from the support of powerful technology. Since the beginning of the debut, Trip Love has a complete 3D model, rather than the common movable live2D in the game's vertical painting, with motion capture technology, you can let Trip Love freely realize actions such as running and jumping; face capture and expression control also make Trip Love's expression change according to the timely line and situation, and will not appear dull. Although there are occasional cases of mold wearing, the technology of tripping love is already ahead of her time, and even now it does not look crude.
"Is it 3D animation?" "Is synthetic sound so emotional?" "Talking MMD?" At that time, although the audience did not understand this technology, they were still attracted by the video content of tripping love: the daily good morning greeting, the "tripping court" that made a judgment on fan letters, the "physical fitness test" that challenged different sports, the "stumbling food tavern" that talked with fans, and a variety of game live...
Trip love tavern
"Trippick Love has the image of an anime character, but it's more like my real-life friends," said Yoo, a fan who has followed Tripwire for many years, adding that the image of Tripwire is not perfect, but it is therefore more real and cute.
"Trippick Ai once played PUBG, because he couldn't pick up a gun, so he could only fight with people, when he escaped, he couldn't jump over the fence, he would triumphantly show off his driving skills, and even if he died quickly, he would excitedly say 'It's fun!'" Even if Trip Love is not a game god, I like to watch her play games. "The love of living in an empty pure white space has slowly attracted more fans.
"Falling to the ground into a box" of tripping love
Four months after the campaign was launched, AI. Channel.'s following exceeded 200,000, and since then, the video of Tripping Love has changed from a weekly change to a daily change, and has also opened the Instagram channel as a new attempt; in December 2017, the number of fans who stumbled on love exceeded one million, and continued to grow at a rapid pace, undoubtedly occupying the first place in Vtuber.
Try to broadcast live, publish photo albums, launch hand-made, star in commercial advertisements, have a title TV program on TV stations, be appointed as a tourism promotion ambassador to Japan, and receive countless awards... Tripping love is getting faster and farther down the road to Vtuber.
Tripped love starred in a ramen commercial
At the same time that She was striding forward, the concept of "Virtual Youtuber" proposed by her was also newly annotated by more people.
With the launch of motion capture systems such as Animoji, Vtuber has become a hot direction in online culture. In the ten months of early 2018, Vtubers on Youtube expanded from less than 50 to more than 5,000. Vtuber, who is at the forefront of the number of views and fans, Hui Yeyue, Mirai Ming, computer girl Siro, and Nekomasu, has also begun to be called the "Four Kings of Vtuber" by fans along with Trip Love.
China, outside of Japan, has gradually emerged as a "Virtual UP". In August 2017, the virtual research agency launched the "virtual dimensional plan", and the virtual anchor combination "Xiaoxi Xiaotao" became the first local virtual anchor of Station B and the first local virtual anchor of Chinese mainland, leading this fresh cultural product into the vision of more people.
In just over a year, the blank canvas created by Tripwire Love has been dyed with such rich colors.
The tide is rising
Bits of color filled the blank canvas, and some people began to try to paint them into a complete pattern. Virtual anchors have gradually found that every video and live content planning after debut, the protection of personal intellectual property rights, and the maintenance and update of equipment are all problems that must be solved for long-term operation.
The virtual anchor office was convenient for this time.
In February 2018, the Rainbow Society, which currently has the most Vtubers, was established. Nine of the top ten virtual anchors with YouTube subscriptions also took shape at this time. The emergence of these firms divides virtual anchors into two categories: the "personal potential" of individual operation and the "enterprise potential" that the company helps operate.
Rainbow Society official website page
The virtual anchor of the enterprise trend has a standing painting drawn by a professional artist, and there are also motion catchers to assist in live broadcasting, and large projects such as the Rainbow Society even have their own motion capture app. By working with popular members of the same firm, even newcomers who have just debuted can quickly have a relatively good popularity. Under the impact of this strong wave, the personal potential virtual anchor gradually appears to be powerless, even Nekomasu, one of the "Four Kings of Vtuber", is no exception.
"Life is really hard—" Nekomasu would say almost every time he went live. During the day, he needs to work at a 7-11 convenience store to make a living, and he can only use his leisure time to carry out Vtuber activities; the modeling done by himself is not only crude, but also often has a strange phenomenon of "fractured" wear; because he is alone, the double ponytail fox lady can only chat with the audience with the voice of the uncle.
Nekomasu, who has problems modeling the ear
Even though it is already the sixth most popular anchor in the national Vtuber survey, Nekomasu's personal channel is still switched to a virtual program channel due to operating costs; real-life pressure has forced Nekomasu to stop activities for nearly a year. More personal anchors who are less well-known than Nekomasu are often forced to graduate hastily from the identity of virtual anchors before they have time to have popularity.
At this time, except for Nekomasu, the remaining few of the "Four Kings of Vtuber" have become corporate anchors. Including Trippick, who debuted as a personal potential, she also joined the upd8 project in May 2018 and received assistance such as event planning. Firms that have sufficient human, material, and financial resources are no longer willing to operate only in Japan, and have gradually begun to march overseas.
In August 2018, rainbow society's parent company held a "second and three virtual anchor projects" in Japan, Shanghai and Taipei, announcing the launch of a large number of new virtual anchors, and other firms also held similar plans to recruit virtual anchors overseas. Many Japanese Vtubers have also gradually begun to launch B-station limited live broadcasts or B-station and Youtube double-push live streaming.
3 months later, Station B held the "Virtual Up Master and Your First Encounter" activity, which was also the first virtual up Master related special event held by Station B officially. Hololive announced a cooperation with Station B, which opened a boom in overseas virtual anchors entering Station B. The Rainbow Society also reached an agreement with Station B shortly thereafter to jointly launch the VirtualReal project, which cultivated Vup, which is well known to chinese people such as Seven Seas and Lingyousa.
VirtuaReal 2021 Chinese New Year group photo
With the support of the firm, the influence of virtual anchors has gradually expanded and they have also stepped onto a larger stage. In December 2018, Trippick Ai held her first offline concert, and in two days, the venues in Tokyo and Osaka welcomed more than 5,000 spectators.
Countless glow sticks converged into a pink ocean, and the tripping love on the screen waved his hands: "Thank you so much for taking me to such a big stage!" Virtual anchors who walk from the screen to the bigger stage are running forward hopefully.
The soul under the model
The industry order has gradually been established, and virtual anchors have also gone to a wider field. But the great contradiction that was once hidden by the tide is gradually surfacing at this time.
On November 4, 2018, Azulim, a virtual anchor of the enterprise potential, issued a call for help during the live broadcast, and posted three unidentified tweets on Twitter in the early morning of the next day: "I will change my personality" and "I am forced to do something I don't want to do"... Messages are then lost. It is reported that her firm has been in arrears for more than half a year.
Azulim's call for help tore through the long-standing filter between the virtual streamer and the audience. Before that, almost all virtual anchors tacitly hid the existence of the "middle person", and Trip Love had repeatedly explained in the video that his behavior and language were the result of artificial intelligence operations and imitation of personality, and would also issue "What is the person in the middle?" Can I eat it? "The joke. Exploring the identity of the virtual anchor "the person in the middle" has also been regarded as a big taboo.
The Douban Soul Group (A-Soul Group) group rules explicitly prohibit information about the people under discussion
"Virtual anchors are like Ultraman, a real-life refuge." A virtual anchor audience member told Poison Eye. At the other end of the screen, it's a vampire, a magician, not a manipulated computer model, which is a beautiful illusion created for fans by all virtual anchors. Azulim's cry for help tore through this illusion and exposed the harsh reality: behind the model is a "hit worker" who is no different from the use of Vtuber to relieve the pressure of life, that is, the "middle man" in the industry.
A month after the incident, the live broadcasting platform Showroom held a selection event called "Virtual Talent Audition • Pole". The 61 contestants will master 5 virtual character models, and only the last 5 "souls that match the character best" will have the right to become "middle people" and debut.
In the competition, different players under the same model are distinguished by numbering and live broadcast to win gifts and votes from the audience. Individuals who were eliminated because of their lack of popularity in the process will no longer be able to use their Twitter accounts, nor can they broadcast live, and their event content will not even be archived - they were once Vtubers, and they were quickly erased.
"As an audience, we know that there are 11 individuals called 'Xiaohong' and 'Lin Zhen' (all of which are virtual character names) who have been stripped of their names and have not left many traces of existence, and in the end, the five people we see have more than ten shadows on them." A comment said.
In the course of more than ten days, many contestants had serious negative emotions such as mental collapse under high pressure, identity confusion caused by desperately putting themselves into roles, and desperately denying themselves because of failure. "Does everyone think this is virtual?" But this is all a reality...! When the best friend "Little Black No. 02" who "contestant" Yui No. 12 gained during his own competition left, he looked at the three bouquets of rose gifts she gave in his live broadcast room and couldn't help but collapse and cry during the live broadcast.
At this time, the audience also realized that for the virtual anchor, the soul of the "middle man" is an inseparable part, and the departure of each individual with his own tone, hobbies, and habits is a cruel and heart-wrenching thing. The match was therefore called "Battle Royale", "Vtuber Personality Integration Process" and "Virtual Anchor Poison Incident".
The "Game Department Planning Artist Bullying Incident" that occurred in April 2019 pushed the conflict between the three parties to the peak: the people in Vtuber, a subsidiary of the firm Unite, issued multiple requests for help tweets, stating that they had been squeezed and bullied by the company.
Four Vtubers were involved in the "Game Department Planning Artist Bullying Incident"
They were asked to live broadcast for 12 hours and were forced to continue to work after a 4-hour break; all personal social media was monitored; sexually harassed, coldly violent, and brutally treated by their superiors; wage arrears and deficiencies, and those who had the intention of resigning but were coerced by the company to get out... Behind the laughing characters, the four of them have been bullied like this for a year.
Since then, the contradictions between the three parties have never stopped. The trip love who has been leading the virtual live broadcasters forward with a positive and optimistic image has almost inevitably encountered similar things. In May 2019, AI. Channel. Uploaded the video "If there are four tripping loves, do you believe it?" " explores the possibility of multiple doppelgangers of tripping love.
On the eve of Trippy's birthday on June 27, Trippick Ai published an article explaining: "This matter has nothing to do with others, it is my own decision... A new challenge to better connect with everyone. But as early as June 9, some netizens issued an article stating that there was only one person left after the early operation team of Trip Love experienced a major water change, and the "Four Trip Love" project was written by Yuichi Vice Shima, director of Activ8.
Just like the lyrics in the birthday single "Sky High" of "The prototype will eventually sleep, the inherited genes, such as the fall of snow", despite the opposition of many parties, the "second love", "third love" and "Chinese love" controlled by other middle people are increasingly appearing in videos and live broadcasts, and even replace the "first tripping love" to participate in public activities. Even the homemade game gifts given by fans to "First Number Trip Love" are also played live by "Number Three Love".
In the live broadcast of the three "tripping love doppelgangers", there were also a lot of satires and remarks that satirized the "first number of tripping love": imitating the collapse of the expression caused by the imperfection of facial capture in the early stage of the tripping activity, making a pornographic edge ball, and satirizing the tripping love" is not a little overwhelmed after its popularity? Stupid", open play "artificial retardation" terrier... And these are all things that the "first number of tripping love" has tried to avoid in the activity, or has publicly stated that they do not like it.
The tone at the end of the stumbling sentence will rise, and there will be cute little movements in the hands that others cannot imitate. And it is not these stand-ins who occupy the shell of love that have always accompanied us, I want to support only the original love person, and others borrow her appearance to make me feel betrayed. Talking about the "Four TripPing Love" project, fan Yoo told Poison Eye.
In this incident, Haruhi Wang, the middle man of the "first number of love", was forced to walk from behind the scenes to the front of the stage. She has repeatedly made remarks on Twitter such as "I don't want to lose to annoying adults and want to protect my content", which confirms the conjecture of fans that "the company violates the wish of 'the first number of tripping love' and recruits more people in order to make tripping love more activities". During a late-night live broadcast, the irrepressible crying of tripping love also became the fuse for fans and the company to oppose each other.
Kasuga's first video submission
"There is absolutely no compromise, the trip to being occupied by other people does not make any sense to me, to let Activ8 see our opinions and attitudes!" Fans launched a "unfollow" protest on platforms such as B station and YouTube. At comic shows in China and Japan, the exhibition area of Trip Love was deserted as never before, and the surrounding sales also declined. There are even radical fans who have threatened to kill Takeshi Osaka, the president of Activ8.
A protest launched by fans of Station B
In an interview, the tripping love official believes that Vtuber has a soul, which does not change depending on the person played. The Vtuber, played by a person, has the concept of 'attacking the name' like Kabuki because fans want to keep watching it, so that the name of Vtuber can continue. "Whether it exists virtually or physically, there is a soul, and it is very sad to deny the existence of the soul."
Frustrated by what Activ8 has done, the tripping fans chose Kasuga, the one who supports it. But this is a unique case in the virtual anchor industry. Just as the fans of the virtual anchor strictly prohibit all the exploration of the identity of the middle person, for the virtual anchor, the appearance of the middle person actually means the collapse of the "human design" and the disillusionment of the beautiful illusion.
"On the surface, he is a vampire handsome man, but in fact, he insults women and falls in love with members of the same society, how do you let me continue to chase?" The comments section of a "collapsed" virtual anchor is full of angry words like this. Habits of life, morals, and even physical appearance... Any information of the person in the middle may conflict with the image of the virtual anchor and bring disgust to the fans. Almost all the people who have openly identified themselves have been violently attacked by fans.
Even for a period of time, talking too much about their real life, or revealing that they are using motion capture equipment, is also regarded as a performance of the "unqualified" virtual anchor. Rainbow Society's virtual anchor Moon Beauty Rabbit admitted in a live broadcast that he put the computer on the washing machine to broadcast live, and used a laundry detergent bottle to support the iPhone X used for catching, which caused many radical fans to depowder.
Fans love the virtual image, but this emotion is real; beneath the shell of the number, there are flesh-and-blood people. That's why until Activ8 was publicly made a favorite, Kasuga insisted that fans not associate her with other works. Because if you want to protect the beloved image in the hearts of fans, the only solution seems to be —
Hold on, but remain silent.
"After all, I'm no longer special"
The maturity of the Internet has brought more advanced technology and more audiences, the narrow canvas has become an endless sea of abundance, and those who have not yet had time to explore farther away, and finally someone has arrived first.
Rainbow Has launched overseas projects such as Indonesia, the United Kingdom, and South Korea, and virtual anchors have taken advantage of the trend to go to more countries; in professional fields such as news reporting, virtual anchors have also appeared. Similar to the "vegetables" played by Cai Ming, the virtual anchors played by well-known public figures have gradually appeared, and they have also opened up a new ecology of virtual anchors.
Vegetables Nanako
The A-Soul girl group jointly launched by ByteDance and Lehua Entertainment marks the beginning of the three-dimensional performing arts company to the field of virtual anchors, with the support of head Internet companies and entertainment companies, constantly refreshing the highest record of the captain of the B station, and the member Jiaran Diana has also become the first native virtual anchor elected as the "B station top 100 up master".
Chinese fans of Tripped Love once promised to "take 1 million fans as a gift for the return of the first number of Trippy Love", but some virtual anchors have achieved this goal one step ahead of Trip Love; and on Youtube, Garo Gula, who has been planning to debut for less than ten months, has also surpassed Trip Love to become the Vtuber with the number of fans, and has ascended to the throne occupied by Trip Love for more than four years.
Although Activ8 issued a statement in May 2020 stating that "No. 2 Love" and "No. 3 Love" will have independent channels and use a new image, no longer using the name "Trip Love", activ8 President Takeshi Osaka arbitrarily blocked the tweets of fans opposing the "Four Trip Love" program, and let "No. 2 Love" and "No. 3 Love" repeatedly replace "First Trip Love" to perform major events, still bringing irreparable damage to Trip Love's popularity.
Love Sauce (Love Number Two) and Aimii (Love Number Three)
Whether it is the increase in the number of video plays or the number of fans, Trip Love no longer has the advantage of the past, and the number of viewers during live broadcasting is even less than that of the virtual anchor with 100,000 fans in the same period. She has been constantly endorsing, and even the first anniversary celebration is busy shooting commercials, and she has only starred in one industrial and commercial advertisement in 2021, and the number of game linkages has dropped significantly compared with before. After experiencing many storms, it seems inadequate at this time.
Tripping love seems to have gradually faded out of the audience's field of vision. The first high-play video after a long period of depression was the announcement that she was about to "hibernate" indefinitely.
"I have always wanted to connect with everyone in the world, experience happy things with everyone, and meet a better future, and I have been active in this mood to this day. Compared to when I first started my activities 5 years ago, human beings have gradually become less and less contradictory in the world, which is a very happy thing! It also became an opportunity for me to re-examine myself, after all, I was no longer special. ”
Behind her are more than 1,800 virtual anchors from different regions and offices, wishing for Tripe's departure. From the stumbling love that used to be full of confidence and said "I am different from other Youtubers", to the stumbling love that now laughs at itself "I am no longer special", behind it is the growth, blossoming and fruit of an era.
A large string of "later periods" floated on the barrage. Even if everything will eventually pass away with the wind, tripping love will be the "most special" in the hearts of countless fans.
Goodbye, trip love.
Text | Wang Ziyue
Edit | Fu Qiongyin
Resources:
Cute Girl Encyclopedia: Trip Love
Cute Girl Encyclopedia: The Incident of the Man in Love
Cute Girl Encyclopedia: Virtual Up Master/History
Memories scattered on the road to poison: the story of the virtual girls - touch