>>81040909I dreamed a scenario where...somehow vtubing market collapsed. Investors are short selling all the stocks, something akin to dotcom bubble. Both Cover and Anycolor are scrambling to avoid the fallout. And then an unspecified big yab happened, somehow many vtubers from big corpos start an exodus. In the middle of it, Baacharu revealed himself to be Hideaki, the CEO of Appland. Revealed a plan to "fix" the vtubing bubble bursting by turning to the fans. He organized a large live concert, with OG chuubas. Main line up? Sora, Siro, Aoi, Mito, they lead the event. A campaign was started, "save vtubing industry" and "return vtubing to fans", donations to support the live. Peanuts-kun and Ponpoko joined, Omesis joined. With the large sums of collective money and networking power, Baacharu is able to buy back Mirai Akari's model and give it to Pepechi, on the condition she joins the live for this time. Pmaru was invited too, and so was Nozomi. The pressure was so big Activ8 and Nozomi agreed to return for this one live. For one moment, one live, they were reunited. The message of the live? They are standing on top of the fans support. They will shine as bright as they can as long as they are together, the biggest unity moment since Kizuna Ai departure. Baacharu sold stocks of Appland to the fans and fanclubs across Japan. After the live, indie scene become stronger than ever, new norm that vtuber companies are now managed similar to those of fan-owned football clubs, with fans having greater say collectively. No longer they are under the mercy of Japanese businessmen in Tokyo playing with spreadsheets.
Appland gained massive PR boost and began using it to scout survivors of the fallout or former talents. The crisis rekindled passions burried within the key players of the industry. And so, big frequent collabs and shared lives becoming a common feature in the scene once again. Both Cover and Anycolor splintered, but they got to keep their IPs for some reason, and a lot of them formed small circles, becoming the new upd8, where vtubers rise from their ashes. Sora and Mito joined Siro in the new DotLive/Appland, Aoi is rather content with her place but still do collabs with them. They will later held a graduation live together, passing down the baton of their legacy to newer vtubers.
Nomu is still missing, but she's there, somewhere, probably.
I might need to drink my meds because it's definitely not coherent, but it sure was a nice fantasy to have. 