Weekly NewsDrop #41—July 09, 2023

Last week, we had Anime Expo in the US—this weekend, we had TwitchCon in Paris. We prepared this newsletter after witnessing the 20th anniversary of the Philippine TOYCON, which has rare VTuber stuff at best.

...except that I found some VTuber-themed YouTooz vinyl figures at one stall inside the con, and I quickly whipped up the camera to take a snap (each figure costs around 1,500 to 2,000 pesos (around $27 to 36).

Tanabata Day was last week, Nana Asteria's latest single Call Unto You is finally released, and Nina Kosaka has exited Niijsanji EN in an emotional 17-hour farewell stream.

Latest on NewsDrop

• Ducky reports from SMASH! 2023 in Australia, where the PRISM Project anthem Be the Light was first heard.
• Hidden Gems, dedicated to VTubers with niche audiences, is being prepared—and voting is already open for several categories. Organizer Petri spoke to Ducky about this initiative.
• On Behind the Model—SaikenMD: “I decided that VTubing would actually be a really cool outlet for me to pursue, being able to kind of put on this anonymity while still being able to kind of show off the lifestyle, the grind or lack thereof, in my case of being a doctor and a streamer.”
• After Mori Calliope has been signed to Universal Music Japan, it's Blue Journey's turn next, as the company establishes joint music label Holo-N aiming to support Hololive Productions' "Blue Journey" music project.

(There will be no weekly VTuber stocks update for this edition, but it will return in the next.)

Last Week's Top Story

One video from a convention circulated into Twitter and eventually on other social media platforms, capturing a segment of a VTuber concert with the caption "the way they all go crazy when he reveals his eyes."

• The original tweet has been removed, but we later found out that it's coming from Thailand.
• We have mentioned before that there was an event called CAF 2023, which was held at the National Gallery Ministry of Culture MRT Thailand Cultural Center on the weekend of June 30 to July 2.

The VTuber in question, Dacapo from Algorhythm Project, received mean comments from those who do not understand that these kinds of VTuber concerts existed before.

• Abby translates Dacapo's latest tweet: "Facing mean people never really made me cry as much as meeting kind people. I always confront the mean ones, and since I’ve started practicing singing, I’ve been living with it. But when I meet someone who is kind to me, I've never experienced it before and it makes me wonder, ‘Do I really deserve it? Someone like me?’"

For additional context, when big VTubers from Hololive Indonesia performed at Cosplay Mania's JAM Concert in the Philippines last year, we've seen comments such as 'moving pixels'.

• On a lighter note: CONQuest 2023 held last June, despite its terrible, terrible operations, had Bao and Shoto as guests projected at the main stage—and fans fill the seats, eager to see them.
• This year's Comic Frontier in Indonesia had several talents from HoloID and other agencies perform on stage as their virtual selves. They got a large audience too.

This shows that there's a gap that needs to be filled in for the mainstream to accept VTubing as a form of entertainment—but who knows, maybe their first entry into these kinds of entertainment is through 3D concerts featuring Hatsune Miku, which is now being implemented by Hololive and Nijisanji.

Thai VTuber agencies can take this opportunity to introduce themselves to the world—there are LOTS of VTubers in the country that we rank them third among their Southeast Asian peers in terms of VTuber saturation (based on information listed on the VTuber.asia database).

Beyond this matter, Dacapo's singing is amazing. No wonder fans were gushing when he showed his eyes to them.

In Other News

• Following the announcement of a joint label by Hololive and Universal Music Group (UMG), Hololive’s music project Blue Journey will be releasing a full album on September 6 titled Song of the Dawn. Moreover, it will also have its first live event on September 13 at the Tokyo Garden Theatre.
• Hololive English’s Mori Calliope sung the theme song for the release of One Piece’s 106th manga volume. The song is titled Future Island and was composed by Wednesday Campanella’s Kenmochi Hidefumi. She also debuted a special model which borrows elements from the character Jewelry Bonney.
• In more Hololive news, Hakos Baelz has released her first EP titled Pandæmonium.
• Twitch launches Discovery Feed, a new feature on the platform which allows a scrollable feed of clips from Twitch, much like Instagram’s Reels or TikTok.
• Japanese entertainment holding company Brave Group has announced a partnership with Geek Hive to aid in the company’s digital transformation strategies, including its IP peripheral systems, as well as research on AI and Web3.
• VTuber agency V&U has finally provided fans with a teaser date for its upcoming third generation: July 14.
• Ailis, the VTuber under the project IZUMO, has finally debuted. Said VTuber project is part of AnotherBall, the latest venture of Shunsuke Oyu, the former founder of the VTuber agency PRISM Project.
• The triad of Sony Music Entertainment Japan’s VTuber projects are now united under a new name: Sony Music Virtual. They are composed of the VTuber projects VEE, PRISM Project, and VERSEⁿ.
• A teaser for viv:ID CRUISE hololive Meet Asia Tour has been released, where Hololive Indonesia talents will headline.
• Metaverse platform Cluster has announced a collaboration with the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) to accelerate ICT education in Japan.
• Pinoy Virtual Bahay returns, composed of several well-known local names such as Maddie, Kaheru, Dasu, Kiichan, among others.
• Reaverse’s Yumeiri Reyu has graduated from the agency to pursue her VTubing career as an indie.
• With Project Kavvaii’s Airi Gwynevere recovering from a multitude of health-related issues, she recently did a stream–but the catch is that she can only use text-to-speech.
• MyHoloTV's Woozie Wannai announces her graduation from VTubing activities.
• VR full-tracking device Uni-Motion is now available worldwide.
• Merchandise from the Lunetide generation of Project Kavvaii are now available for sale through Playasia.

We close this edition with a heartfelt message from Unnämed-san:

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