The California VTuber convention OffKai Expo announced on Tuesday that it was removing Nijisanji English talents Enna Alouette, Millie Parfait, and Reimu Endou of Ethyria from its 2024 guest list. The convention cited concerns that their appearance would “not be conducive to a positive convention experience for ANYCOLOR Inc.’s Livers or our attendees.”
This comes as Nijisanji and its parent company Anycolor Inc. have been rocked with scandals in the wake of the termination of former VTuber Selen Tatsuki. In addition, new details regarding the termination of former talent Zaion LanZa have recently come to light.
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On Monday morning, FalseEyeD, host of the VTuber news program Things VTubers Say, claimed to have received information about what he described as “strange” application rejections by OffKai Expo. He put out a call for more information, stating his “DMs are open.”
Included in False’s post was an image depicting the rejection e-mail, merged together with a screenshot of the OffKai Expo featured guests page. The guest page included Nijisanji EN’s Ethyria group, Enna Alouette, Reimu Endou, and Millie Parfait.
Source: FalseEyeD, YouTube.
This caused other X users to speculate that the artists and other talents that had been rejected from the convention could be related to Ethyria’s presence at the convention.
Both Enna and Millie were directly implicated for bullying Selen Tatsuki in the infamous “Black Screen Stream” hosted by fellow Nijisanji EN VTuber Elira Pendora, with Vox Akuma, and Ike Eveland. Obsessed Nijisanji fans had also recently published a block list of artists and other supporters of Selen Tatsuki / Dokibird.
Source: Crisu, YouTube.
In a response to FalseEyeD’s post, OffKai Expo would deny the allegations. “We’re deeply concerned to see there’s talks of strange guest & vendor rejections and would like to assure people that Nijisanji has not [influenced] our guest or vendor hall decisions at any point in time.”
This was followed by an announcement later in the day that Nijisanji EN’s Ethyria group of VTubers would no longer be attending the convention.
“After thoughtful consideration, OffKai Expo believes that recent events have resulted in an environment where Ethyria appearing would not be conducive to a positive convention experience for ANYCOLOR Inc.’s Livers or our attendees. As such, Enna Alouette, Millie Parfait, and Reimu Endou will not be appearing at OffKai Expo 2024.”
In a follow-up reply, OffKai Expo refuted claims that this was a kneejerk reaction to FalseEyeD’s post, claiming “this was a decision made two weeks prior and has no relation to today’s events and misunderstandings.” The convention also offered refunds to fans that wanted one, with a deadline of April 30th.
This claim was then backed up in an article written on the VTuber NewsDrop website, where they spoke with an executive at the convention to clear up any confusion about the cancellations.
According to VTuber NewsDrop, OffKai Expo had engaged in lengthy debate among themselves about how the convention should respond to the Selen Tatsuki situation, and had only come to the conclusion to engage Nijisanji in renegotiations to remove their VTubers from the guest list two weeks ago.
Readers familiar with Nijisanji’s mishandling of Selen Tatsuki’s termination will not be surprised by how negotiations unfolded. Anycolor Inc. representatives dragged their feet in conversations with OffKai Expo, which prevented them from posting the notice on the morning of March 4th, when FalseEyeD’s post went live.
While OffKai Expo confirmed to VTuber NewsDrop that FalseEyeD’s post had nothing to do with their sudden announcement, they confirmed that False’s post “undid the thought and planned” that they had regarding the situation. That may be a corporate way of saying it sped up Anycolor Inc.’s response in negotiations.
OffKai Expo also expressed a desire to replace the lost guests.
Do you think OffKai Expo made the correct choice to remove Nijisanji VTubers from their guest list? Are you disappointed that Ethyria will no longer be attending OffKai Expo 2024? Leave a comment and tell us what you think.
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