{"id":19967,"date":"2021-12-08T13:31:05","date_gmt":"2021-12-08T05:31:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/?p=19967"},"modified":"2021-12-13T21:29:51","modified_gmt":"2021-12-13T13:29:51","slug":"virtual-idols-real-fans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/2021\/12\/virtual-idols-real-fans\/","title":{"rendered":"Virtual Idols, Real Fans"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Virtual idol industry is booming in China, attracting millions of fans who chat and play with their idols online
By Ella Lang<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Li Jingyuan became a fan of A-SOUL this April, after accidentally clicking into their live streaming channel on BiliBili, a Chinese video-sharing platform. \u201cIt was interesting to watch their live streaming,\u201d Li says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThey read fans\u2019 live comments, chat with fans, and play games designed for interaction with fans when live streaming. I feel like I am a close friend of theirs,\u201d the Year Two university student says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Debuted on December 11, 2020, A-SOUL is a virtual girl group created by Yuehua Entertainment and technologically assisted by ByteDance. The group has five members, who are Ava, Bella, Carol, Diana, and Eileen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The virtual girl group has 288,000 fans on BiliBili. Their latest single Super Sensitive was released on May 1, 2021,and it received over 4 million views and 156,000 likes on BiliBili as of December 6, 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
A-SOUL is a virtual idol group with five members (Photo Courtesy of A-SOUL\u2019s official Weibo account)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Though Li is a student with no income, he has spent approximately RMB \u00a51,500 (US $235) from his pocket money on buying animation merchandises including a fan-made doll and virtual presents on BiliBili.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Recognising himself as an animation, comics, and games (ACG) lover, Li pays very little attention to real Chinese stars. He says A-SOUL is his first and only idol.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf A-SOUL were real human beings, I probably would not have become their fan,\u201d Li says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cReal idols\u2019 fan groups are too alienating. For example, raising funds through personal channels, voting from day to night, and battling with other fan groups. And here comes the Qinglang campaign to regulate them. I feel lucky to be in a harmonious and peaceful fan community,\u201d he adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Li Jingyuan received A-SOUL member Carol\u2019s fan-made doll this October (Photo courtesy of Li Jingyuan)<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The Qinglang campaign was introduced by the Cyberspace Administration of China in June to regulate \u201cchaotic\u201d online fan club activities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Apart from A-SOUL, a new wave of China-born virtual stars is emerging, such as Yousa from BiliBili or Xing Tong (\u661f\u77b3), a virtual idol from Tencent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Virtual idols can be roughly divided into two categories, both using avatars as performance fronts. One is a virtual singer, represented by Luo Tianyi (\u6d1b\u5929\u4f9d) and Hatsune Miku (\u521d\u97f3\u672a\u4f86). Their vocals are synthesised using Yamaha\u2019s Vocaloid, a voice synthesiser software, which allows users to pay for voice database and compose songs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The other type is a virtual Youtuber or virtual live streamer like A-SOUL. Behind the virtual idol, there is a real human actor who never shows up on camera. By using motion capture technology or software, the actor\u2019s movements and expressions are reflected on the virtual image.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The scale of the virtual idol industry in China increased 70.3 per cent year on year to RMB \u00a53.46 billion (US $540 million) in 2020. It is predicted to reach RMB \u00a56.22 billion (US $970 million) this year, according to Chinese data mining and analysis platform iiMedia Research.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Love across Screens<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Alex Guo became a fan of A-SOUL after watching its member Diana\u2019s birthday live streaming on March 7, which was his first click on A-SOUL\u2019s live channel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was impressed by the heart-to-heart communication between Diana and fans. I became her fan when she read letters from fans and shed tears,\u201d Guo says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So far, Guo has spent RMB \u00a51,000 (US $156) on buying animation merchandises and virtual presents. He uploaded A-SOUL\u2019s spoof videos on BiliBili in June and August 2021, which attracted 970,000 total views as of December 7, 2021.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn fact, A-SOUL\u2019s appearance,vocal and dance skills are not outstanding compared to other virtual Youtubers. But they continue to improve. I am glad to witness their progress,\u201d Guo says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the fan group, some fans produce songs for virtual singers. Steven Tan, a fan of the first Mandarin-speaking virtual singer Luo Tianyi, is one of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs a composer with no reputation and not enough budget, it was difficult to find a singer for my compositions. So I thought virtual singer was a good choice,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tan bought three virtual singers\u2019 vocal databases, each at a price of around RMB \u00a5500 (US $79). He composed 36 songs and released five albums. All songs were sung by virtual singers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think virtual singers can overcome the limitations of real singers. Virtual singers never get tired, and they can reach a very high pitch,\u201d Tan says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA virtual singer can sing thousands of songs in a month because its vocal database is accessible to anyone who pays. But it may take months for a real singer to release one song,\u201d he adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Steven Tan\u2019s NetEase CloudMusic page<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think virtual singers can overcome the limitations of real singers. Virtual singers never get tired, and they can reach a very high pitch,\u201d Tan says.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Still a Long Way to Go<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Anthony Fung Ying-him, professor of the School of Journalism and Communication at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, thinks virtual idols in China have a bright future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe Qinglang Campaign influences real stars by measures such as shutting down accounts and cracking down on fan activities, but it will not affect virtual idols and their fans. This helps the virtual idol industry to grow,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fung points out that the core attraction of virtual idols is the interaction between fans and idols. \u201cVirtual idol fans can chat, play games with, and produce content for their idols. It is almost impossible for real idol fans to approach  their idols,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBut there is still a long way to go for virtual idols to replace real idols. It is hard for virtual idols to reach diverse groups of people because it is essentially a kind of subculture,\u201d Fung adds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Edited by Eve Lee<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Edited by Eve Lee
Sub-edited by Lynne Rao<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Virtual idol industry is booming in China, attracting millions of fans who chat and play with their idols onlineBy Ella Lang Li Jingyuan became a fan of A-SOUL this April, after accidentally clicking into their live streaming channel on BiliBili, a Chinese video-sharing platform. \u201cIt was interesting to watch their live streaming,\u201d Li says. \u201cThey […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":20215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1856,7,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-issue-161","category-periscope","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19967"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20350,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19967\/revisions\/20350"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/varsity.com.cuhk.edu.hk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}