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The Street
The Street
Brian O'Connell

Will YouTube fans accept a big influencer who's creating his own AI replacement?

Maybe you’ve heard of Jordi Van Den Bussche, aka Kwebbelkop, a video gaming fanatic and a major YouTube influencer with an audience of 15 million viewers.

The self-described “personality gamer” seems to be burning out having to cobble together video after video, and has a unique solution to the problem. He’ll turn the whole enchilada over to his new AI persona.

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“Every time I wanted to take a holiday or I needed some time for myself, I couldn't really do that because my entire business would stop,” Van Den Bussche told Wired. “I'm retired from being an influencer . . . I've had a lovely career. I had a lot of fun. I want to take things to the next level. And that means making this brand live on forever.”

In that context, Kwebbelkop is rolling out a new YouTube campaign designed to create an artificial intelligence version of himself, “using AI tools designed to create and upload videos”, according to Wired.

Van Den Bussche's new platform on Alphabet's (GOOGL) -) YouTube opens for business this week, after several weeks of pumping up the transition on X. The campaign is two-pronged:

First up is an AI tool that mimics a creator’s image from previous videos and turns it into a new YouTube video.

Second, is a prompt-driven AI video tool that asks AI to take an article and turn it into a video using the creator’s likeness.

More Business of AI:

Van Den Bussche tested the AI model on a new AI-powered YouTube creation called Bloo, which launched in 2021. Bloo not only gained 775,000 subscribers, it allowed him to take a training wheels approach to AI creation, which has led to the new AI Kwebbelkop, which dropped on Aug. 2.

“It’s modeled after me and my creativity and my input,” he told Wired. “Everyone thinks I’m retiring as a creator and letting this AI run, but I’m not retiring as a creative.”

Will his fans tune in to an AI version of Kwebbelkop? As Bloo's success has already indicated, the audience may be open-minded about the transition.

“Huge success is an overstatement I think,” says one X follower.

“Just gave it a watch with my morning coffee. SERIOUSLY impressive mate,” said another.

It’s early, but maybe Kwebbelkop - or his AI avatar - is onto something.

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