Ironmouse | ||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Personal information | ||||||||||
Nationality | ||||||||||
Occupations | ||||||||||
Organization | VShojo | |||||||||
Twitch information | ||||||||||
Channel | ||||||||||
Years active | 2017–present | |||||||||
Genres |
| |||||||||
Games | ||||||||||
Followers | 2.15 million [1] | |||||||||
Associated acts | ||||||||||
YouTube information | ||||||||||
Channel | ||||||||||
Years active | 2017–present | |||||||||
Subscribers | 1.17 million [2] | |||||||||
Total views | 143 million [2] | |||||||||
| ||||||||||
Last updated: October 5, 2024 |
Ironmouse is a Puerto Rican-American VTuber, singer, and Twitch streamer. Active since 2017, she is a founding member of the VTuber group VShojo launched in 2020. As of 2024, she has over two million followers and is the second most-subscribed Twitch streamer of all time, surpassing Kai Cenat's first record during a September 2024 subathon. [a] [3]
Ironmouse originally planned to pursue a career as a coloratura soprano opera singer, but was diagnosed with common variable immunodeficiency (CVID), an immune disorder that has left her largely bedridden and isolated. It has also led to a lung infection called mycobacterium avium complex as she revealed to Projekt Melody in 2021. [4] This required her to remain isolated from others, a situation which intensified in 2020 amid the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. [5]
In 2017, she began to pursue a career as a streamer instead, as she was "lonely and wanted something to do". [5] Hesitant to use her real face online, she was inspired by the Japanese entertainer Kizuna AI, the first YouTuber to refer to themselves as a "virtual YouTuber" [6] —to stream with a digital avatar to conceal her identity. [5] Her username comes from the villain Sailor Iron Mouse from the manga series Sailor Moon. [7]
After discovering that there were a growing number of users referring to themselves as VTubers like Kizuna, she began to consider herself one. The Ironmouse persona was expanded into a character, which she referred to as a "bigger version of me" and being like a superhero costume; [8] [9] her avatar usually takes the form of a horned demon with pink and purple hair, [5] while its backstory—influenced by her having jokingly referred to herself on-stream as such—suggests that the character is a personification of Satan itself. [5] Ironmouse's distinctive, high-pitched speaking voice is the result of a lung infection due to CVID complications which also resulted in her being on oxygen support 24/7; she has remarked that some people have refused to take her seriously because of her voice, and that some fellow streamers have been shocked to find out that it was her real voice, and not being manipulated with a voice changer. [5] [10]
Amid a growth trend for streamers in general, and especially VTubers, [11] [12] Ironmouse's audience on Twitch began to see increases over 2020 and 2021. The increasing revenue from her streams also allowed her to afford higher-quality health care. In turn, improvements to her condition enabled her to perform longer streams on a more regular basis. [5] In November 2020, Ironmouse was announced as one of the charter members of VShojo, a new U.S.-based agency of English-language VTubers, joining other streamers and personalities such as Nyanners and Projekt Melody. [13] [14]
Ironmouse is known for her frequent collaborations with Welsh YouTuber CDawgVA; he had learned of VTubers via Gigguk—one of his colleagues on the Trash Taste podcast. After watching an Ironmouse stream on Twitch out of curiosity and finding her to be "really funny", CDawgVA brought her up during a Trash Taste episode with Hololive English member Mori Calliope as a guest. The acknowledgement led to interest from Ironmouse, who had been also been following CDawgVA's own streams. Her involvement began with a voice cameo in one of his videos, and later collaborative streams; CDawgVA described himself in an interview with Dexerto as the "straight man" to Ironmouse's "chaotic" personality, while Ironmouse has considered him "genuine". [15] [16]
In February 2022, Ironmouse held a subathon event, a nonstop stream in which a countdown clock was extended whenever viewers purchased paid subscriptions or otherwise made donations to the channel. [5] The stream remained online even when she was asleep, during which other content, such as videos, and appearances by her friends and other guests, were featured. [17] Over the course of the event, which ran for a total of 31 days through March 7, 2022, [5] Ironmouse became the most-subscribed to female streamer on Twitch, and had the largest number of active subscribers of all Twitch channels at the time (although short of an overall record set by Ludwig during a similar event he held in 2021), [18] [19] with nearly 172,000 subscribers in total by the end of the event. [5] Ironmouse has occasionally hosted a talk show—Speak of the Devil—which features various guests. [20]
According to data from StreamElements and Rainmaker, Ironmouse was the eighth-most watched streamer on Twitch during the month of February 2022—marking the first time that a VTuber had made their monthly top 10. [21] Discussing the event, Ironmouse felt that it was "the only time I didn't feel lonely because I felt like I had somebody there all the time. It was the least lonely I've ever felt in a long time." [5]
In December 2022, she was listed among the "heroes" on the Plasma Hero website for raising awareness about CVID and encouraging viewers to donate plasma. She has also received praise for encouraging donations to The Immune Deficiency Foundation (IDF), a charitable organization which helps people suffering from conditions like hers through research and improving the quality of life of people suffering from primary immunodeficiency. [22] According to StreamsCharts, Ironmouse was the second most-watched female Twitch streamer of 2022, behind Amouranth. [23] [24]
In June 2023, Ironmouse held a second subathon event as a charity event, with half of all revenue from Twitch subscriptions and Bits, as well as merchandise sales during the event, being donated to the Immune Deficiency Foundation. The subathon broke her previous record of 172,000 subscribers and set a new record of 205,461 subscribers. [25]
On December 7, 2023, Ironmouse won the award for Content Creator of the Year at The Game Awards 2023, becoming the first VTuber to win in the category. [26]
On September 10, 2024, YouTube suspended Ironmouse's VOD channel, supposedly due to copyright strikes. [27] On September 20, her main YouTube channel was also suspended; in response, she tweeted that she was "incredibly sad and shocked". [28] Both of Ironmouse's YouTube channels were later reinstated on September 23. [29] That same month, Ironmouse overtook Kai Cenat as the most-subscribed channel on Twitch, setting a new all-time record for the service on September 30. [30] [31] [32] Her record lasted until November 2024, when it was broken by Cenat. [33]
From early in her career Ironmouse has been keen on educating more people on CVID and PI. In an interview with plasma-hero she said, "At the time, I think I was so worried I didn't realize how talking about it could raise awareness; I don't make my illness the main focus of my content, but I do speak about it from time to time for education and awareness and to explain why I may not be feeling my best at times". [22] On August 4, 2021, she held a charity event for Immune Deficiency Foundation (IDF) and raised over $100k. This caused many creators like CDawgVA to follow in her footsteps and raise more money for the charity, In an interview with the Immune Deficiency Foundation, CDawgVA stated "I find that often it’s the people that we really care about who… force us to learn about stuff we’ve been ignorant about or that we’ve allowed to be ignorant about because we haven’t had to deal or be exposed to any of the ideas.", acknowledging her role in educating him about PI and the Immune Deficiency Foundation. [34] She also did a 30-day subathon in June 2023 and a 39-day subathon in September 2024, where she donated half of all the subscription income to the Immune Deficiency Foundation. [22] [16] [35] [36]
Ironmouse also has raised a significant amount of awareness for donations and the importance of plasma. She stated in an interview with plasma-hero, "I know so many people encourage blood donation, and I want to make sure I can reach as many people as I can to tell people about living with a PI and donating plasma. I want more people to know that we are here and we need support, but I also want people to know that they are not alone." [22] She used her platform to encourage more people to donate plasma and her efforts were well received as more people started to donate plasma, as she quoted in an interview with Dexerto , "It's really nice to be able to see so many people tweet at me every time I donate plasma, which is something I never saw before, It's just really nice to see the reception that everyone has given me, and the fact that people wanna know more about it, and people wanna donate plasma, and people wanna help out because it's a rare disease, and not a lot of people know about it." [16] Her efforts for raising awareness were also well recognized by the Immune Deficiency Foundation (IDF), which earned her the "plasma hero award" on 2024 PI Conference. [34] She is also artistically involved in raising awareness, on June 12 2024, Ironmouse released her single "Carry On" which was the ending song for the "Compromised: Life without immunity” documentary by the Immune Deficiency Foundation. [37]
Title | Year | Album | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|
"Waifu Jam” | 2023 | Non-album singles | [38] |
"Rodents Kingdom” | 2024 | [39] | |
"Devil” | [39] | ||
"Carry On" | [37] |
Title | Year | Original From | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|
"Headless Angel" | 2024 | Goddess of Victory: Nikke | [40] |
"Otonoke" | 2024 | Dandadan | [41] |
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
2023 | Smite | Persephone | [42] |
2024 | Granblue Fantasy Versus: Rising | Dormouse | [43] |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Result | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|
2022 | The Streamer Awards | Best VTuber Streamer | Nominated | [44] |
12th Streamy Awards | Best VTuber | Nominated | [45] | |
2023 | The Streamer Awards | Best Just Chatting Streamer | Nominated | [46] |
Best VTuber | Won | |||
13th Streamy Awards | Streamer of the Year | Nominated | [47] | |
Best VTuber | Nominated | |||
The Game Awards | Content Creator of the Year | Won | [48] | |
The Vtuber Awards | Vtuber of the Year | Won | [49] [50] [51] | |
Miss Vtuber | Won | |||
Best Streamed Event (Ironmouse Subathon 2023) | Won | |||
Best Concert Event (Candy Pop Explosion) | Nominated | |||
Feb 2024 | The Streamer Awards | Streamer of the Year | Nominated | [52] |
Best VTuber | Won | |||
Dec 2024 | Pending | [53] | ||
Best Marathon Stream (ironmouse Subathon 2024) | Pending | |||
The Sapphire Award | Pending |
A VTuber or virtual YouTuber is an online entertainer who uses a virtual avatar generated using computer graphics. Real-time motion capture software or technology are often—but not always—used to capture movement. The digital trend originated in Japan in the mid-2010s, and has become an international online phenomenon in the 2020s. A majority of VTubers are English- and Japanese-speaking YouTubers or live streamers who use avatar designs. By 2020, there were more than 10,000 active VTubers. Although the term is an allusion to the video platform YouTube, they also use websites such as Niconico, Twitch, Facebook, Twitter, and Bilibili.
Projekt Melody, or more commonly known as Melody for short, is an American 3D anime-styled live streamer, or VTuber, and pornographic actress. She first appeared when her Twitter account opened in July 2019, and she has live streamed on Chaturbate and Twitch since early 2020. During her first three days of Chaturbate streaming, Melody's Twitter followers rose from 700 to over 20,000, and her sudden rise in popularity had mixed reactions. In late 2020, Melody became a founding member of VShojo, one of the first VTuber talent agencies based in the Western world. She describes herself as an artificial intelligence, although she is performed by a real person.
Ludwig Anders Ahgren, known mononymously as Ludwig, is an American live streamer, YouTuber, podcaster, comedian, esports commentator, and competitor. Ahgren is best known for his live streams on Twitch from 2018 through late 2021, and on YouTube beginning in late 2021, where he broadcasts video-game-related content as well as non-video-game-related content such as game shows and contests. He is also known for his work as an esports commentator at various Super Smash Bros. Melee tournaments. He is the co-owner of the esports organization Moist Esports. He began streaming full-time on February 16, 2019.
Hololive Production is a virtual YouTuber agency owned by Japanese tech entertainment company Cover Corporation. In addition to acting as a multi-channel network, Hololive Production also handles licensing, merchandising, music production and concert organization. As of November 2024, the agency manages over 90 VTubers in three target languages, totaling over 80 million subscribers, including several of the most subscribed VTubers on YouTube and some of the most watched female streamers in the world.
VShojo is an American talent agency that focuses on promoting VTuber content creators based in San Francisco, California. VShojo bills itself as a "talent first" agency, oriented towards providing resources to its talent.
Youna Kang, better known by her online 3D Virtual YouTuber persona CodeMiko and alias The Technician, is a South Korean-American Twitch streamer and YouTuber. Kang is best known for her live streams on Twitch, for interviewing other streamers, content creators, and internet personalities as her alter ego persona CodeMiko, and for pushing the envelope with regards to interactivity in VTuber technology.
Connor Marc Colquhoun, known online as CDawgVA, is a Welsh streamer, YouTuber, voice actor, and podcaster currently based in Tokyo, Japan. He is affiliated with the Kadokawa-backed agency GeeXPlus.
Darren Jason Watkins Jr., known online as IShowSpeed or Speed, is an American YouTuber and online streamer. He is known for his variety live streams that showcase dramatic and energetic behavior, as well as his IRL streams in worldwide locations.
The Streamer Awards is an annual awards show dedicated to live streamers. It was founded in 2022 by Twitch streamer QTCinderella to award and celebrate other streamers, primarily in the Twitch community. Nominees are selected via an online vote by fans and winners are then determined using a weighted combination of the online popular vote (70%) and panelist vote (30%).
Yoo Yoon-jin, better known as Jinnytty, is a South Korean online streamer. Jinny is best known for her in real life (IRL) livestreams on Twitch where she has garnered more than 1,000,000 followers as of March 15, 2024.
Blaire, known online as QTCinderella, is an American Twitch streamer, YouTuber, and podcaster. She is the creator and host of The Streamer Awards. She is also a co-host of the Wine About It podcast and the Fear& podcast.
On March 14, 2021, American livestreamer Ludwig Ahgren began continuously livestreaming on Twitch. The livestream ended on April 13, 2021, after 31 days. A subathon is a type of livestream in which viewer donations add more time to a descending timer that counts down to the end of the stream. Throughout the streams' duration, Ahgren received 282,191 subscriptions, breaking the previous record set in 2018 by Tyler "Ninja" Blevins of the most concurrent subscribers on Twitch. The subathon's content consisted of talking to his viewers and stream moderators, playing games, and sleeping, among other various daily activities. During Ahgren's sleep breaks his moderators entertained the audience, for which they were financially compensated. Ahgren grossed US$1,434,850 from the stream, before taxes, charity donations, and other deductions. Not including sponsorships, Ahgren profited $202,000.
Kai Carlo Cenat III is an American online streamer and YouTuber who specializes in comedic live streams and videos. As of 2024, he is the fifth most-followed Twitch streamer with 13 million followers and most-subscribed Twitch streamer of all time, surpassing Ironmouse's record during a November 2024 subathon. He was named "Streamer of the Year" at the 2023 and 2024 Streamer Awards.
Neuro-sama is an AI VTuber and chatbot that livestreams on her creator's Twitch channel "vedal987". Her speech and personality are powered by an artificial intelligence (AI) system which utilizes a large language model, allowing her to communicate with viewers in the stream's chat. She was created by a computer programmer and AI developer named Vedal, who had the idea for an AI VTuber by combining a large language model with a computer-animated avatar. She debuted on Twitch on 19 December 2022.
On August 4, 2023, at approximately 3:30 p.m., American Internet personality Kai Cenat held an event - supposedly a giveaway of gaming-related items in New York City's Union Square, without a permit. He had posted several announcements a few days prior, stating that his partners Fanum, Duke Dennis, and Agent00 would be with him. Anyone who could adequately answer questions related to YouTube and live streaming would be given a prize. The event, which drew thousands of participants to Union Square Park, became a riot. Social media posts of the event surfaced around the same time. During the riot, 7 people were injured, and 65 people, including 30 minors, were arrested. The neighborhood's subway station and surrounding stores closed during the incident.
Usada Pekora (兎田ぺこら) is a Japanese virtual YouTuber affiliated with Hololive Production. She is part of Hololive Japan's 3rd Generation, "hololive Fantasy." In addition to being one of the most-watched members of Hololive, she is one of the most-watched female streamers.
The Vtuber Awards, also styled as The VTuber Awards, are awards presented to the best in the VTuber industry organized by talent management company Mythic Talent. The first ceremony was held in 2023.
Nicholas Stewart, better known as Jynxzi, is an American Twitch streamer, YouTuber, and player of Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege, an online tactical shooter game. He is the 5th most-subscribed Twitch streamer of all time. He was named "Best Breakthrough Streamer" and "Gamer of the Year" at the 2024 Streamer Awards.
it's called mycobacterium avium complex