Man, I don't know how to blog, but okay.

So originally, my ideas of my thesis was initially based on studying how "influence" is built: such as establishing an audience, keeping viewer retention and other various things by reviewing how it is done on YouTube. Social media influencers are being used more and more today as effective branding mascots, and when I was introduced to the topic of virtual celebrities, I found that to be the almost natural next step of optimizing branding.

But given my more pointed interest in the gaming industry rather than social media, I figured I could also use these virtual idols in a different way to study successful character building. Virtual influencers have the unique advantage of not being limited to existing purely in a TV show, movie,  book or game. Instead, they can interact live with an audience, update freely with cultural trends and react to world news -- they're essentially their own product to sell to the audience without the benefits of a game or movie setting. The character has to be good enough to stand out on its own, visually appealing enough to attract and audience, and be more developed personality and background-wise than just a mascot face. The success of these idols are testament to the company's character building and their actor's understanding of their character and given performance.

The next couple posts will be about what I'm reading and looking into so that'll just be a mess of references.