Meet Shylily, Twitch\u2019s unapologetic orca VTuber who rewrote the rulebook Twitch: ShylilyShylily went from unknown to Twitch sensation basically overnight. The orca VTuber has climbed to nearly a million followers in less than a year, rewriting the rulebook for the medium along the way by being unapologetically herself. VTubing has its quirks and charms. For many creators, it\u2019s more than just getting an animated model and calling it a day. There is, or at least was, expectations of having some sort of lore with a beautiful heartfelt story, plus some level of character immersion. It was a different world to what Shylily once knew on Twitch. The unapologetic orca VTuber is open about their past, having streamed on the platform since 2015. Seeing the medium\u2019s rise piqued her interest, and over the course of a year she blossomed into one of Twitch\u2019s biggest VTubers with more than 900,000 followers and a rapid growth only rivaled by some of the platform\u2019s other stars like Kai Cenat. None of this wouldn\u2019t have happened, however, if it wasn\u2019t for a \u201cmeme\u201d bet back in 2015. \u201cBasically I lost a bet,\u201d she laughed when recapping her origins to Dexerto. \u201cI was dared to stream Minecraft if I lost a bet. It was a meme in my friend circle. I lost that bet and I did stream. \u201cThe stream worked out rather well, I had face cam and everything, and I was like \u2018I guess I\u2019ll get my makeup on, open up OBS, pop on the face cam, let\u2019s go.\u2019 I had a couple of people who came by to say hi and it was fun.\u201d Back then she was just living her life, working outside of streaming in the restaurant industry, and had a decent plan for the future. Streaming was just a way to pass the time for some social interaction. Once things got busy outside of that, she deleted everything except her \u2018Shylily\u2019 Twitch account. \u201cWork was going really well, I was going places in my job and about to have my own restaurant, managing all that,\u201d she continued. \u201cI could put my education to use, finally I\u2019m doing something my mother is proud of.\u201d Then the global health crisis came crashing in, and suddenly she was out of a job. There were no opportunities elsewhere, and so there she was, looking at that abandoned Twitch account, and she felt the urge to go live once again. \u201cThere\u2019s only so much you can apply to when everyone loses their job, and there\u2019s nothing there anymore. So I just streamed again, and around that time VTubing was already a thing and I discovered it. \u201cBasically I became a VTuber because it was really fun to mess around. I was suddenly Hatsune Miku and it was pretty f**king cool, I like that. I got into the \u2018role\u2019 a little bit, but I eventually dropped the role. I had the impression VTubing had to have this cute little voice and high pitched. I just dropped it because it hurt after a while.\u201d She\u2019s not sappy about her lore as an orca, it\u2019s just a cute visual. She doesn\u2019t play by the VTuber meta rules, filling up her schedule with collabs and constantly having to do something. Instead, she takes what she did all those years ago \u2014 walking around in circles in Minecraft doing literally nothing but talking to chat \u2014 and instead of having her face posted in the bottom-right corner, there\u2019s a \u201cbig tiddy anime girl\u201d. \u201cDon\u2019t know what to do? Become a VTuber. Don\u2019t have a lore. I don\u2019t really have a lore, I just became a VTuber,\u201d she laughed again. \u201cThis lore thing was from people asking me \u2018everyone has a lore, what\u2019s yours?\u2019 I was bored, that\u2019s my lore! VTubing looked fun, and I wanted to give it a try.\u201d \u201cVTubing has this specific meta where it\u2019s collab-heavy, game-heavy, all those things. But I just talk. I do the fleshtuber thing where I sit in the camera with a Starbucks and talk for two hours, except there\u2019s no Starbucks. I\u2019m just a React Andy.\u201d Shylily didn\u2019t play by the VTuber rulebook, and found success. This wasn\u2019t in the life plan a few years ago, but now it\u2019s all she knows and wants to know. The trickier part is making it last. Swapping from facecam to VTubing Speaking to Shylily, the first part of the name doesn\u2019t really match her personality. Even just watching a minute of her stream, she is an open book talking about every topic under the sun. It can be like whiplash following along, but it\u2019s the brand she\u2019s made for herself. Originally a facecam streamer, Shylily used her broadcast as a delivery service for random conversations. The gameplay in the background \u2014 first Minecraft, then League of Legends and World of Warcraft \u2014 was secondary to the interaction between her and chat. Streaming to her wasn\u2019t some high and mighty content cause. It was, in every sense of the word, a pastime. \u201cI wasn\u2019t addicted to streaming,\u201d she said. \u201cOnce a week or every two weeks I\u2019d hop online, but I still felt like I had this weird urge to do sh*t online instead of focusing on work.\u201d However, that exposure to the streaming space before the VTuber boom shaped the style of content she\u2019d create upon her return. Her lived experience as a facecam streamer was mixed, to say the least. The platform struggled, and still does, with a gender gap issue as female streamers were held to different standards to their male counterparts. It was a major consideration when returning to streaming. As much as it\u2019s amazing to be an anime girl, there was also a desire to maintain some privacy. \u201cAs much as I enjoyed Twitch, back then that website was ruthless,\u201d she elaborated. \u201cIt was nasty, especially if you were a female, you were treated like an object. \u201cPeople would make clips of my channel where I\u2019d slam the desk and my webcam would fall down, so I lean over to adjust it and people are like \u2018oh tits.\u2019 I\u2019d get up to grab a glass of water and people are like \u2018oh thighs\u2019. For the most part it didn\u2019t bother me, but there are better days and worse days. \u201cOn those bad days, suddenly a dude will come into my DMs and screenshot a folder that\u2019s just clips of me categorized by tits, ass, thighs, belly, moans. I was like \u2018bro you clip all those weird moments?\u2019 I felt so objectified because it\u2019s my body, my face, my voice. I was tired of that garbage.\u201d That hate didn\u2019t stop when she became a VTuber. In fact it arguably grew, purely based on having a bigger audience and the law of ratios coming into play. The insults just changed, and it turned into something she was more okay in dealing with in a public-facing industry. \u201cLet\u2019s say 1-5% that just absolutely despise you, be it because you\u2019re the person that you are, or the content you do \u2014 being a VTuber, a Minecraft streamer, whatever it is. They just like to hate and be like \u2018bet it\u2019s a guy behind the camera, an old dude with a voice changer.\u2019 \u201cI\u2019m not saying VTubing helps to hide behind it, but you have this very clear differentiation between real life \u2014 me, my face, my body, me as a person \u2014 and what people associate with my name online. It does help to separate those things and when you turn off your stream, you turn off that hate and you don\u2019t have to deal with it anymore. It doesn\u2019t hit as personal anymore.\u201d The pressure was off when it came to streaming in multiple regards. She didn\u2019t have to worry about the hours-long preparation to show herself on broadcast, making sure every inch of her body was perfectly groomed to appease some arbitrary standard. Beyond that though, Shylily also had encounters as a facecam streamer that concerned her before her hiatus. Even with her comparatively small following, people would stop her in the street for random conversations. To her they were just strangers, and the one-way relationship made her feel uneasy. She didn\u2019t want to deal with that again. VTubing hasn\u2019t made her immune to those interactions, but the community has been generally more \u201crespectful\u201d about that anonymity. \u201cI\u2019d just be at a train station and some dude would pressure me into buying me Dunkin Donuts and eating them with him,\u201d she recounted. \u201cI didn\u2019t know how to handle situations where people would walk up to you in real life and interact with you like they know you. \u201cTo you, it\u2019s a random person on the train walking up to you, grabbing my longboard and saying \u2018yo Lily, cool board, looks really nice\u2019 and I\u2019m like \u2018who are the f**k are you? You can\u2019t just grab my sh*t.\u2019 I would not be able to deal with it as well nowadays with my bigger presence online now. People would recognize me a lot more often now, just randomly grocery shopping.\u201d Exploding onto the VTuber scene When Shylily started VTubing, she had a few thousand leftover followers from her early days. Some quizzed her about the swap from facecam to VTubing, but the reception was mostly positive. However what she didn\u2019t expect was a near-overnight explosion into the streaming consciousness. Lily worked hard in the lead-up to her Live2D redebut in early 2022, getting the word out there with networking and announcements in the months beforehand. And for her, she just ended up winning the Twitch lottery in some regard. \u201cI was live streaming like every other day. I did the same sh*t every day,\u201d she explained. \u201cBut it took people to notice I exist because when I debuted my new model, I made the announcements and networking to make sure it was known, made sure it attracted a larger crowd.\u201d Part of her success she attributes to clipping channels like Cooksie, who watched her debut and spread the word far and wide about her antics. The flood of followers afterwards left her confused and thinking her channel was being botted. However it showed the importance of one thing in Shylily\u2019s eyes: being marketable. \u201cI did the same thing every day for two years, but I had no way to advertise myself to a larger crowd. When I did though, I blew up \u2014 quite literally overnight. \u201cIt\u2019s a bit sad too. Maybe some people who aren\u2019t making it big aren\u2019t making bad content, but they just have bad discoverability. I didn\u2019t do TikTok, YouTube, or much on Twitter that could count as networking. I was just doing my thing every single day.\u201d Clippers do have a divisive reputation in the VTuber community. While they are great for discovering new content creators and keeping up with active streamers, there are issues with channels taking things out of context \u2014 either innocently or nefariously \u2014 and also stepping on the original creator\u2019s toes. But Shylily sees it as \u2018no harm, no foul\u2019 when it comes to the importance of their role in the space: \u201cPeople have opened up more to the idea of clippers, but my guy, they take work off your shoulders. \u201cIf you have your own clip channel, I can understand how clippers can be annoying. But I feel half the people who don\u2019t like clippers don\u2019t even upload clips, so why does it matter to you if someone makes a living off of sharing your content? Are you that selfish? I thought you were a streamer because you wanted to make people happy and give them a good time. \u201cYou\u2019re watching someone else\u2019s meme compilation. You\u2019re watching an Asmongold video, HowToBasic, whatever you want. You\u2019re a React Andy \u2014 you\u2019re making monetary gain eating your instant ramen watching a meme compilation. Stop being stuck up and lecturing people on how they can and can\u2019t use your content.\u201d Shylily also reforged the VTuber meta in her wake. As she rocketed up in followers \u2014 gaining around 100,000 a month for most of 2022 on her road to 1 million \u2014 people took notice of what she was doing differently. Yes, she plays games and collaborates. But people don\u2019t tune into her stream to watch her interact with others. They watch for Shylily. That\u2019s an important distinction the orca highlights. She doesn\u2019t just accept collabs to play games she\u2019s not interested in. She does interact with others in the space, but tries to stay out of the echo chamber. She streams the same content she did as a facecam streamer, not seeing the real purpose in conforming to the \u2018meta\u2019 this medium had curated for itself. Sometimes she\u2019ll hop on a trend if she enjoys it, such as subathons (which she treats as a personal challenge to entertain fans for as long as possible). In that, people started changing their perspective on VTubing. \u201cThat changed the meta a bit because I blew up with that and suddenly when I see clips on YouTube, it\u2019s not someone having a funny moment in a collab. It\u2019s them reacting to memes, playing a game by themselves. \u201cPeople are so hungry for collabs, but that can\u2019t be healthy for the streamer. They can\u2019t fill their schedule because people don\u2019t have time to collab. They must have asked a billion people to collab, and on the days they don\u2019t have a collab they just don\u2019t stream. I\u2019m like why not? Chat is there for you. You are their content. It\u2019s healthy for your chat, and you too, to just be yourself and have fun doing what you want to do. \u201cI don\u2019t really care about what others do, or what impact it has. I just do what I want to do, not because someone else is doing it. If you\u2019re doing something that someone else is doing, what\u2019s the incentive of watching you over them? Especially when they\u2019re more established. So just do what you want to do \u2014 if you\u2019re following the meta, there\u2019s not really an incentive to watch you.\u201d Dropping the streamer ego and being vulnerable As the growth came through, Shylily was trying her hardest to keep up. Indie VTubers go at this alone typically, doing everything from scratch and occasionally commissioning some help when it comes to art or other things outside of their skill set. It was taking its toll a few months in. She hadn\u2019t seen her family in months, even after things started opening up again. Shylily managed to move out to a bigger house thanks to streaming, but she hadn\u2019t even set up anything outside her computer room because it could wait while going live couldn\u2019t. \u201cI found myself being a bit too dependent on stream. I let it sink in a couple of weeks ago. I moved into my new place around three months ago. I have worked my ass off to move into this place, just so I can unpack my streaming setup and go live. I had nothing. No towels, no furniture. I have my setup on the floor and I went live. \u201cI still didn\u2019t unpack because all I needed was that streaming setup, and I thought maybe that mentality is a bit unhealthy. Maybe I\u2019m a little too attached to the idea of live streaming. I have this bigger place but I live smaller because the rooms are full of boxes that have to be unpacked and that\u2019s it.\u201d There was \u201cno work-life balance\u201d, she emphasized, and that was an expectation when going into this line of work. But instead of letting that become the norm, she wanted to try and make it sustainable. Streaming was a passion, and if that passion was paying her bills, she wanted it to keep it alive for as long as possible without burning out. Shylily ended up hiring a team of staffers to help her out daily. She has a manager, Boeska, to facilitate everything now \u2014 collabs, merch drops, the lot. The orca was also very candid in telling fans she would be cutting down stream hours and taking at least one day a week off to avoid burnout. Streamers, especially independents in the VTuber space, have this \u201cego\u201d to go alone in Shylily\u2019s eyes. But once she realized no one cared but herself, and all she was doing was running herself into the ground, she did away with all of that \u2014 and it was for the best. \u201cIt\u2019s one thing to see a person online for eight hours a day and say \u2018well that\u2019s basically a 9-5 job.\u2019 But people don\u2019t realize how much goes into it off stream. The networking, the appointments, showing up to other people\u2019s streams, fixing setups, planning new layouts, avatars, costumes, seasonal sh*t. \u201cAs an indie, you only have yourself and I wanted to keep that status. But I realized no one gives a sh*t except me. The agency VTubers don\u2019t see you as more admirable just because you do the work they do but you do it yourself, the other indies don\u2019t see it because they\u2019re like \u2018I also do it myself\u2019, and the viewers don\u2019t see it because they don\u2019t see the effort beyond live streaming. No one except me cared, and so I said f**k it, got a manager, and sorted my work-life balance out and add some life back into there.\u201d There\u2019s also the pressures that come from her audience about staying relevant. It\u2019s not enough to just play the \u2018meta\u2019 games. If she\u2019s going to play Genshin Impact, she has to make sure on launch day she\u2019s up to snuff on the story and willing to roll on the new banner. But she can\u2019t do all that grinding on stream, so her days off evaporate just as quick. \u201cPeople are like \u2018oh you\u2019re just playing Genshin\u2019 but I need to stay relevant \u2014 no one wants to watch me play Genshin if I\u2019m some casual. On launch day, you need to C6 the new character. You spend way too much money in a game and people are like why do you do that? Well I wouldn\u2019t normally if it wasn\u2019t for streaming \u2014 I couldn\u2019t care less if I didn\u2019t have the new character. I\u2019d never spend all this extra cash on a pixel, but you have to stay relevant.\u201d If she didn\u2019t take these measures, Shylily is convinced she\u2019d burn out and \u201cnever go back to being quite the same\u201d. She\u2019s doing everything in her power to keep a healthy relationship with streaming so it can be her forever future. \u201cThey hit the spot where they went too far, cut off too much, and every time they fix it, you see the scars. It\u2019s always there. It will never fully heal. They push too far one time, and that\u2019s just how it is now.\u201d Being unapologetically Shylily As Shylily approaches one year since her big redebut and nearing one million followers, there\u2019s a lot of learnings she\u2019s made. There\u2019s the aforementioned ones about burn out and making content you\u2019re happy with. The other is being unapologetically yourself and letting things develop naturally. This includes all the sides of the orca VTuber, whether you see them as good or bad. Sometimes the VTubing community can be \u201cstuck up\u201d compared to other mediums, she said. But if you just let things flourish, you\u2019ll have a healthier relationship with streaming. Shylily didn\u2019t make her signature \u2018womp womp\u2019 a trend, but her chat did. At the end of the day she\u2019s an entertainer and whatever the crowd finds funny ends up sticking. \u201cPeople keep thinking that as a VTuber you need to make branding things for yourself \u2014 noises, icons, fandom names. As a streamer, you don\u2019t do any of those things. Chat decides what\u2019s your thing. I haven\u2019t decided a single one. Shrimps? Not my thing, but that\u2019s the name of my community. The orca pup with the dog legs? Not my thing, but chat made it a thing. Womp womp is the same.\u201d However Shylily is also aware of the fact she lucked out. VTubing and streaming changed her life for the better, and it was all because of a particular set of circumstances falling her way. She did gently guide it all to a place she was comfortable with, but like her other \u2018bits\u2019, it was out of her hands. \u201c[VTubing] got me out of a deep f**king hole. I thought life was over. I thought I was going to have to live off government support and get screwed over, but it\u2019s great because now I have a proper life I can be proud of.\u201d If it didn\u2019t work out, she would have just gone back into the food industry as it was something she developed a real appreciation for. But the crossovers between why she loves streaming and hospitality are evident too. \u201cI really enjoyed being close with people though, making them smile, especially when you work in a place where tourism is a big thing. You meet so many people from various cultures and they have stories to tell and they love to tell them. \u201cYou\u2019ll stand at their table, ask where they\u2019re from, and they\u2019ll go on this big rant for 10 minutes about where they\u2019re from, their plans, and it\u2019s so interesting because you see their eyes light up and they\u2019re so full of passion. That flipping of the switch in their brain, it\u2019s so wholesome to see. I feel like I may or may not have a thing for that.\u201d As long as she can continue doing that to an audience online via VTubing, Shylily will continue to stream. She has no grandiose goals like \u201c\u2018I want to become the biggest indie VTuber, bigger than any agency VTuber!\u2019\u201d She just wants to do \u201cher thing\u201d, and have people who appreciate her for who she is. And to think this wild future spawned from a bet in 2015. Isn\u2019t it funny how life changes? \u201cIt\u2019s crazy how it started off as a memey Minecraft stream just because it was an inside joke. Guess that worked out.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Meet Shylily, Twitch\u2019s unapologetic orca VTuber who rewrote the rulebook Twitch: ShylilyShylily went from unknown to Twitch sensation basically overnight. The orca VTuber has climbed to nearly a million followers in less than a year, rewriting the rulebook for the medium along the way by being unapologetically herself. VTubing has its quirks and charms. For […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-58961","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58961","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58961"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58961\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58961"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58961"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58961"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}