VTuber

A VTuber (Japanese: ブイチューバー, Hepburn: BuiChūbā) or virtual YouTuber (バーチャルユーチューバー, bācharu YūChūbā) is an online entertainer who uses a virtual avatar generated using computer graphics. Real-time motion capture is often used to capture movement and changes in facial expression. The digital trend originated in Japan in the mid-2010s, and became an international online phenomenon in the 2020s. The majority of VTubers are live streamers. By 2020, there were more than 10,000 active VTubers. Although the term is an allusion to the video platform YouTube, they also use websites such as Niconico, Twitch, Facebook, Twitter, and Bilibili. VTubers are associated with Japanese popular culture and aesthetics, such as anime and manga, and moe anthropomorphism with human or non-human traits. Some VTubers use anthropomorphic avatars, including non-human characters such as animals. The first entertainer to use the phrase "virtual YouTuber", Kizuna AI, began creating content on YouTube in late 2016. Her popularity sparked a VTuber trend in Japan, and it spurred the establishment of specialized agencies to promote them, including major ones such as Hololive Production and Nijisanji. Fan translations and foreign-language VTubers have marked a rise in the trend's international popularity. Virtual YouTubers have appeared in domestic advertising campaigns and have broken livestream-related world records.