The Business: The Need For Detachment By Livestreamers

An Australian Twitch streamer that I am familiar with went off on a 30 minute rant last night about parasocial relationships with regard to herself. I'm not going to name her because this post isn't about her, but about a very stupid pattern of behavior I see from wannabee dancing monkey types that see being a full-time livestreamer on Twitch (et. al.) or a full-time YouTube power-user as a viable career path.

The problem is that these streamers fail to maintain professional distance with their audience. They cultivate and monetize this audience through the illusion of a personal connection, conversing with their audience via the chat channel on a frequent and regular basis as if they were personal friends, like a latter-day Oprah Winfrey. Then they get shocked when that audience expresses parasocial behavior that they become uncomfortable with.

The error is sharing personal information with an impersonal party. It is borderline unethical if it is done specifically to form an emotional relationship for the purpose of extracting resources from them at a profitable rate of exchange. Too many wannabee professionals, wanting to be the next Ninja, Dr. Disrespect, or Pewdiepie, make this very error.

"But that's the hustle!"

Hololive called and said you're full of shit.

The professional VTubers--Hololive and their rivals like Pikamee--fully understand that entertainment is a business, and therefore the need for professional detachment. Being a non-real avatar and persona greatly aides this, but the fundamental part--the cornerstone--is the observation of Operational Security. In short, bitches need to shut the fuck up about inappropriate dicussion topics and act like the professionals they say they are. Then they wouldn't need to rant about parasocial relationships and boundaries.

No, aforementioned Aussie girl isn't the only offender, and it's not only women that do this. It is, however, something that's nigh-exclusive to people who put their real faces on camera and play that up to their advantage. It's also not a major issue with folks who are legit doing this as a hobby, maybe one that pays for itself, and not as a revenue stream to pay the bills; a lot of folks I follow don't have this issue because they're hobbyists with day jobs and are not wanting to be dancing monkeys.

It's almost exclusively a problem with real-face would-be professionals that willfully manipulate an illusion of personal connection to gain and grow an audience.

It is also a self-solving problem; let them face the consequences of willfully and recklessly forming personal connections for business reasons, however violent they may be. It will serve as an abject lesson as to why you don't act like a scheming grifter playing on the emotions of a target to long-con them out of their wallets. While the VTubers still have their weirdo problems, they remain far more managable due to that professional detactment and unreal presentation; it's about time that the rest did that too.