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INTEREST: Kizuna Ai Management Company Activ8 Reports 675 Million Yen Deficit in August 2019




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VORTIA
Subscriber



Joined: 26 Jul 2005
Posts: 941
PostPosted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 3:23 pm Reply with quote
Not surprising, considering the botched issue with Ai-chan's voice. I rarely visit her channel anymore, sadly. The quality went straight downhill.
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Yuvelir



Joined: 06 Jan 2015
Posts: 1529
PostPosted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 3:59 pm Reply with quote
How do you even lose that much money with something that is pretty much a cheap to produce advertising machine?
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harminia



Joined: 24 Aug 2015
Posts: 1987
Location: australia
PostPosted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 4:00 pm Reply with quote
is the era of virtual youtubers slowly ending?
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-SP-





PostPosted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 4:54 pm Reply with quote
harminia wrote:
is the era of virtual youtubers slowly ending?

Hopefully
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Megiddo



Joined: 24 Aug 2005
Posts: 8360
Location: IL
PostPosted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 5:29 pm Reply with quote
Yuvelir wrote:
How do you even lose that much money with something that is pretty much a cheap to produce advertising machine?

If I were to guess, by moving profits to a shell company to avoid a higher tax rate.
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rx32555



Joined: 12 Oct 2010
Posts: 2
PostPosted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 8:39 pm Reply with quote
No surprise here. The multiple voice thing was a mistake. Kizuna AI lost her identity.
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Hoppy800



Joined: 09 Aug 2013
Posts: 3331
PostPosted: Wed Jan 29, 2020 9:20 pm Reply with quote
harminia wrote:
is the era of virtual youtubers slowly ending?


Nope it's growing, it's a thing in China as well. People are still throwing money at them and they are adapting when demonetization occurs.
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Yuvelir



Joined: 06 Jan 2015
Posts: 1529
PostPosted: Thu Jan 30, 2020 4:03 am Reply with quote
Megiddo wrote:
Yuvelir wrote:
How do you even lose that much money with something that is pretty much a cheap to produce advertising machine?

If I were to guess, by moving profits to a shell company to avoid a higher tax rate.

That does sound pretty plausible...
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Uokel



Joined: 28 Jul 2013
Posts: 94
PostPosted: Thu Jan 30, 2020 5:39 am Reply with quote
HoloLive and Nijisanji are dominating the Vtuber space right now and based off the last few live shows those two did (like the recent Hololive 1st fest) they are not going anywhere.
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FukuchiChiisaia





PostPosted: Thu Jan 30, 2020 6:35 am Reply with quote
Uokel wrote:
HoloLive and Nijisanji are dominating the Vtuber space right now and based off the last few live shows those two did (like the recent Hololive 1st fest) they are not going anywhere.


Yeah. Especially with Nijisanji opening branch in South Korea, Indonesia, and India. While Hololive with their China and Indonesia branch as well.
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pwnagemaster



Joined: 09 Dec 2017
Posts: 88
PostPosted: Thu Jan 30, 2020 9:17 am Reply with quote
harminia wrote:
is the era of virtual youtubers slowly ending?


Nah, Hololive just debuted 5 new girls at the very end of last year, and one is already up over 150k subs, and the other 4, who debuted a bit later, all have between 50k and 85k.
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maximilianjenus



Joined: 29 Apr 2013
Posts: 2858
PostPosted: Thu Jan 30, 2020 10:32 am Reply with quote
The solution is simple. they should lower Kizuna Ai's wages.
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Yuvelir



Joined: 06 Jan 2015
Posts: 1529
PostPosted: Thu Jan 30, 2020 11:09 am Reply with quote
maximilianjenus wrote:
The solution is simple. they should lower Kizuna Ai's wages.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2oCV2sM_ig
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KabaKabaFruit



Joined: 20 Sep 2007
Posts: 1869
Location: Winnipeg, Manitoba
PostPosted: Thu Jan 30, 2020 5:44 pm Reply with quote
The news doesn't surprise me one bit with all the controversy that had surrounded the Kizuna Ai character and Upd8's handling of the situation from the past year. When the Kizuna clones showed up and began passing themselves off as being good as the original Kizuna Ai, it was at that point that everyone began asking questions over what direction the channel was legitimately heading to...and with good reason.

The Kizuna clones were just...confusing. They severely retconned the environment that Ai-chan was accustomed to to the point of being glaringly inconsistent considering Ai-chan's past complaints about being "all alone" in the white space. Then, the clones began having more and more stream time to the point where even the nastiest YouTube commentators were starting to make legitimate sense when they started getting on board with everyone else and asking where the original Ai-chan was.

Then, we had that ridiculous update on Ai-Chan's 3rd birthday bash showing the Chinese Ai that was meant to give linguistic ease to the Chinese Kizuna Ai fans only to have the Chinese fans go "WTF?" and questioning the actual need for the character when all THEY wanted was to enjoy JAPANESE Ai-Chan in all her original glory!

Then the original Kizuna Ai voice actress stopped appearing altogether and we ended up getting clone banter from the replacement actors which REALLY pissed off the fanbase as evidenced in the YouTube commentary and the first livestream post original Ai-chan.

Even if Ai-chan's original actress had returned by now (which I can't confirm as I hadn't been on A.I. Channel in months), the damage was done and upd8 has a glaring scar to bear for it. Fingers are being pointed at Yuichi Soejima, executive producer of Activ8 over the whole kerfuffle.

If Kizuna Ai isn't being considered relevant anymore, it's not surprising and I find that to be a terrible shame as I enjoyed Ai-chan's antics throughout the years only to have backroom corporate interests contaminate the character and insult the fanbase for it.
harminia wrote:
is the era of virtual youtubers slowly ending?

Nope. Aside from Kizuna's voice swap controversy and Kaguya Luna's once-a-month updates, all other VTubers are still going strong. Siro chan is still providing new videos every day or two and the Omega Sisters are now considered official YouTube product helpers thanks to their product promotions. Smile
-SP- wrote:
Hopefully

...why? What do you have against Virtual YouTubers?
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