Glossary

The following are a list of general terms and phrases often used within the Hololive and Virtual YouTuber communities.

Glossary

#

8

• Multiple 8s indicate the sound of clapping (pachi pachi pachi) in Japanese. Typically used at the live chat after a VTuber's performance or a successful clear of a challenge/game. The clap emoji () is used for the same purpose alternatively.

A

AkaSupa

• Short for "Red Super Chat". "Aka" (赤), being the Japanese for "red". The highest tier for Super Chat are colored red on streams.

Anti

• Anti (アンチ) is someone who is really against a particular VTuber. While some antis might simply dislike them, some might go as far as bullying them to try to get them to retire or even dox them.

B

Bakage

• Japanese meaning "silly game", Bakage (バカゲー) are games played on streams that are purely nonsensical and are not meant to be taken seriously.

Batsu game

• Batsu games (罰ゲーム) are a common element in Japanese variety shows. Meaning "punishment game", this takes place when a losing VTuber takes a challenge which is unpleasant to them. See also: Batsu game on Wikipedia.

Belok

• Belok is the Indonesian word for "turn" but is often used as "cheater". Jokingly used to refer to someone who watches multiple talents' streams at once.

Boing Boing

• Boing Boing is a term referring to someone who has large breasts. Opposite of Pettanko. Popularized by Uruha Rushia, who claimed to be boing boing despite this obviously not being the case.

Bottom Left

• Bottom Left is a term originating from a stream by Takanashi Kiara, where members of hololive English -Myth- were ranked on a compass based on their purity (See: Seiso) and intelligence. Someone lacking in both would be place in the bottom left part of the compass. Kiara's illustrator, huke, suggested she belongs exactly in that place of the graph. Other members and the fans have used the scale in different quadrants, but ultimately the "Bottom Left" part remains the most popular. The term has since evolved, and is primarily used for those lacking only in the "purity" scale.

Brother

• See Sibling.

C

Corpo

• Corpo refers to VTubers who are affliliated with a corporation. Hololive members are thus all corpos.

COVER

• COVER Corporation is the company that owns Hololive.

D

DD

• DD, acronym for "Daredemo Daisuki" (誰でも大好き I love anyone), is a term used for fans that like multiple members of a VTuber group. Also a term used in Idol communities.

Daipan

• Daipan is the action of hitting a desk out of frustration.

Debut voice

• Refers to the type of voice a VTuber uses during their debut, which is sometimes different from the voice they use later. Notable example is Mori Calliope, who used a much higher voice during her debut than the one she currently uses.

Desk-kun

• Desk-kun is a term usually used whenever a Vtuber hits their desk when frustrated. Often follow by negative health point values, "Desk-kun -10hp", "Desk-kun -100hp", the exact number depending on how hard they hit the desk.

Doxxing

• Doxxing (ドックシング) means attempts to discover and release information relating to the real identity of a VTuber, such as their past online identities, real name or even their real address. As a result, doxxing is widely looked down upon in the VTuber community.

Dramatuber

• Dramatuber are Youtubers (who may or may not also be VTubers) whose content is based around drama in their circle (in this case, VTubers). Dramatubers are infamous for using sources of dubious credibility (for example, 4chan) and presenting their findings as facts. As a result many consider them immoral who will lie in hopes of more views. As a result, when watching content from dramatubers, one should always check the source.

E

Egosa

• Egosa (エゴサ) is short for "ego searching" or "ego surfing". It is the act of looking up one's own username online to read about themselves.

EN Curse

• EN Curse refers to the odd tendency for members of Hololive English and of English language VTubers in general to suffer of technical issues, particularly around their debut.

G

Gachikoi

• Gachikoi (ガチ恋) is a term describing fans that are in love with a VTuber, as well as the state of being in love with one. Also a term used in Idol communities.

Grass

• See Kusa.

Guerilla

• Streams that are not officially scheduled in advance. Viewers may not know about the stream happening until the moment they begin. Some VTubers often announce or decide if they will do a guerilla stream or not on their social media.

GWS

• Short for Get Well Soon. Used as a response to people who are acting Halu, often accompanied by a picture of a pill.

H

Halu

• Halu is short for the Indonesian word Halusinasi, which directly translates to "hallucination", and is commonly used to describe someone who is delusional and has unreasonable beliefs, like being married to a talent.

HoloGra

• Short for Holo no Graffiti.

Horage

• Horagē (ホラゲー) is short for "Horror games".

I

Ikebo

• Ikebo (イケボ) is short for "Ikemen voice" (イケメンボイス) which means "a handsome guy's voice". Used often to describe a (female) VTuber speaking in their "handsome" male voice. Also a term used in the Utaite community.

IKZ

• Short for ikuzo (いくぞ), Japanese for "let's go". Frequently said in chat, primarily by Kaigai Niki, when something is about to happen.

Inaff

• Portmanteau of Ina and enough. Ninomae Ina'nis has a fondness for puns and whenever she does one, chat commonly responds with inaff, often in all-caps. It is often also seen when anyone in Hololive does a pun and sometimes for VTubers in general.

Indie

• Indie is short for independent and while the term is used in various different communities and industries, in VTubing, indie refers to a VTuber who is not affliliated with a company.

J

JP Bros

Term used primarily by western audiences for the Japanese audiences.

K

Kaigai Niki

• Kaigai Niki (海外ニキ) or "Overseas Bros" is a term used by (mainly Japanese) VTubers to refer to fans and viewers outside of Japan. It is a portmanteau of kaigai (海外, "overseas" or "foreign") and aniki (アニキ, "older brother").

Kamige

• Opposite of "kusoge", means "god" + "game", a "superior or very well-made game".

Kusa

• Kusa (草) is Japanese for "grass" and is also an internet slang roughly equivalent to "lol". Laughing is often expressed using "w", which stands for "wara" (笑), meaning laughter. Lots of wwwww in a row looks like grass.

Kusogaki

• Kusogaki (クソガキ) is a term used to describe a person who acts like a spoiled brat. It can also be used as a nickname for Murasaki Shion, Kobo Kanaeru, Laplus Darknesss, and Machina X Flayon.

Kusoge

• Kusogē (クソゲー) is Japanese slang roughly meaning "very bad game". The term is most commonly used to describe video games but can be used to describe any game. Such games may have poor quality and/or frustrating gameplay.

L

Listener

• Listener (リスナー) is the term that most livestreamers, including Hololive talents, use to refer to the people watching the stream. The term originated in radio talk shows, where listeners could send mail and postcards to be read on the air. This type of interaction between a talent and their audience is similar to what is found in livestreamed videos, so the name was adopted as-is.
  • Other similar names for a viewing audience are not used because they may be confusing: "shichousha" (視聴者) refers to television viewers, while "viewer" (ビューア) is mostly used to refer to physical computer screens.

L2D

• Live2D refers to both the technique and software created by Tetsuya Nakajo for animating 2D models. Most Virtual YouTubers use Live2D models for streaming. See also: Live2D on Wikipedia.

M

Mama

• Refers to the Virtual YouTuber's Character Designer/Illustrator. May sometimes refer to the VTuber's Modeler as well. See also: Papa.

Men gen

• Men-gen (メン限) is short for "Menba Gentei" (メンバー限定) or "Members only". This refers to streams and videos only Members of a VTuber's channel can access and participate in.

MeSubaru

• Portmanteau of mesu (雌, female, feminine) and Subaru. Oozora Subaru is known for being a tomboy, so whenever she acts feminine, people refer to her as MeSubaru.

Minecra/Maikura

• Minecra (マイクラ) is short for "Minecraft".

MMD

• Short for "MikuMikuDance", they are animated 3D models that can track a person's movements and replicate them on screen. Most Virtual YouTubers use them for streaming in their 3D forms. See also: MikuMikuDance on Wikipedia.

N

Nijisanji

• Nijisanji (にじさんじ), sometimes written as 2434 (read nijisanji in Japanese), is a Japan-based VTuber group and the largest VTuber group in the world by the amount of members. Aside from the main branch, they also have an English-language branch. They used to have Korean and Indonesian branches but they were merged into the main branch. Hololive members have semi-frequent collaborations with members of Nijisanji.

O

Off-collab

• Short for offline collaboration, a collaboration where two or more VTubers meet each other in reality, rather than online as is usual for collaborations.

Oshi

• Japanese meaning "to back" or "to support", Oshi (推し) is a term used by fans to denote which VTubers they are a fan of and support the most. Also a term used in Idol communities.

Otsu-

• Short for "Otsukaresama" (お疲れ様), meaning "thank you for your hard work" or "goodbye". Many VTubers have a variation of Otsu (おつ) as their farewell greeting on streams.

Overseas Bros

• See Kaigai Niki.

P

Papa

• Refers to the Virtual YouTuber's Character Designer/Illustrator. May sometimes refer to the VTuber's Modeler as well. See also: Mama.

Pettanko

• Pettanko (ぺったんこ) or simply Pettan (ぺったん), roughly translating as completely flat, is a term used for those who are flat-chested. Opposite of Boing Boing.
  • Pettank- is a meme referring to Uruha Rushia's dislike for being called a Pettanko. Anyone trying to say that she is one has their sentence cut short, implying she killed them for trying to call her a Pettanko.

PON

• Short for Ponkotsu (ポンコツ) meaning "clumsy", "useless" or "unreliable". It is a slang in Japanese comedies. A member is being called PON, when they flunk at an important moment, which often adds to their charm.

R

Russia Niki

• Russia Niki (ロシアニキ) are Kaigai Niki from Russia. Often fans of Shishiro Botan, who is quite popular in Russia and refer to her as Empress Botan (императрица Ботан, Imperatritsa Botan).

S

Seiso

• A VTuber meme, Seiso (清楚) is a term which can be translated as "wholesome". It refers to a character type defined by innocence, purity, and propriety. It is also used ironically to refer to a character who definitely does not have those qualities, or who tries and fails to act pure and wholesome. "Seiso" as a meme originated with Siro and is strongly associated with Tsukino Mito (in both cases, in ironic usage).

Sibling

• VTubers who have the same character designer or Live2D modeler, such as Shiranui Flare and Arurandeisu. In VTuber circles, this is the more common definition and rarely refers to blood relatives unless specified.

Sister

• See Sibling.

StarColle

• Short for stars*collection!

SupaCha

• YouTube's monetizing system for their streaming service, alongside Super Stickers and Memberships.

T

Taiki

• Taiki (待機) means "stand-by". Viewers use it on the stream's live chat to indicate when they are waiting before the scheduled stream begins.

Teapot

• A safety word (primarily used with Watson Amelia) that the viewers say when the live stream is lagging or got disconnected.

Teetee

• A VTuber slang, it comes from "toutoi" (尊い), meaning "precious". Usually written in Japanese as "ていてい" or "てぇてぇ".

Totsu machi

• Japanese meaning "Call-in", Totsu machi (凸待ち) are streams where a VTuber waits for prearranged callers (usually other VTubers) to take turns having unscripted conversations with the host. The guests can potentially introduce subjects or questions that the host is unprepared for or are reluctant to discuss on-air, so totsu machi can be considered a form of batsu game from losing a competitive bet. Conversely, a reverse totsu machi (逆凸待ち) is a stream where a VTuber will call guests, this can be prearranged or not.

U

Utawaku

• Japanese for "Live singing", Utawaku (歌枠) are streams where a VTuber sings songs live through a track list that may or may not be completely predetermined. The singer may solicit viewer suggestions and may also fulfill viewer requests by briefly singing a capella for a few lines of the requested song.

V

VTuber

• An online entertainer or live streamer who is typically represented by a digital avatar generated by computer graphics such as Live2D. See also: Virtual YouTuber on Wikipedia.

VTweeter

• VTweeter is a derogatory term referring to people who claim to be VTubers but spend little to no time streaming and instead spend their time using Twitter. A typical VTweeter has their debut indefinitely as TBD and their tweets are often political in nature.

VShojo

• Formed in 2020, VShojo is a VTuber group based in the United States and one of the first VTuber groups based outside Japan. The EN Hololive members occasionally collaborate with members of VShojo. Despite the name (roughly Japanese for Virtual Girl and a play on Japanese word bishojo (美少女), meaning pretty girl), the group is no longer all-female as of September 30, 2023.

/vt/

• /vt/ is the VTuber board of 4chan. The board is infamous in the VTuber community for having a lot of antis.

W

WWWW

• See Kusa.

Y

YAGOO

• Nickname of the COVER corp. CEO Motoaki Tanigo. The name YAGOO itself originated from one of Roboco's streams, where Oozora Subaru misspelled Tanigo as Yagoo.

YouTube-kun

• Though it can refer to YouTube in general, YouTube-kun is a term that is most often used when talking about YouTube in a negative sense, most often when the stream is having connection isssues.

Z

Zatsudan

• Meaning "Free talk", Zatsudan (雑談) is a segment of, or an entire stream, during which a VTuber casually talks about miscellaneous topics. This may involve viewer interactions and impromptu Question & Answer sessions, typically through the use of the Marshmallow site.

Zenloss

• Meaning "Total loss", Zenloss (全ロス) is a combination of "Zenbu" (全部 all) and "Loss". Referring to the massive losses VTubers experience in games, like losing items they took a long time to gather and farm for. Typically a term used during Minecraft streams.