In my studies, I focused heavily on online cultures, specifically media and fan practices around YouTube and Twitch content creation. I have acted as chat mod and video editor within this space for years and finished my degree with an A+ thesis on corporate VTubing. I examined the methods used to develop and market virtual YouTubers as approachable streamers, stars and characters of a fantasy story at the same time – possibly the first scholarly text about this growing culture in the anglosphere and German speaking countries.
[T]he voice is the only sensually tangible proof of a physical body in a physical space and therefore, the streamer’s realness. And yet, it is always microphoned and therefore mediated.
p. 19
Read my full thesis here:
“Where the agency provides the virtual body:
Production, commodification and media practices in corporate VTubing”
Considering the VTuber as a construct that incentivises parasocial relationships, combines methods of stimulating desire and idolisation with a fundamental unattainability and utilises fan labour to enact itself adds to a strong pull towards stardom.
p. 38