A YouTuber with 15 million subscribers has launched his own AI replacement. Some viewers are skeptical, but he thinks it'll secure his legacy.

• Jordi van den Bussche has been posting gaming content on YouTube for over a decade.
• He's now announced he'll be stepping away from the camera, thanks to an AI replacement.

A YouTuber has launched his own AI replacement, which will now be starring in and producing videos on his behalf. It's caused quite a stir among viewers who are debating whether they're fans of the drastic change.

Jordi van den Bussche, a gaming creator based in Amsterdam in the Netherlands, has been posting on YouTube under the moniker "Kwebbelkop" since 2011 and has so far amassed a following of 15.1 million subscribers.

Across much of this time, he'd spend a typical day on the job scripting, filming, and guiding his team of editors and thumbnail artists on putting his videos together, working from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., he told Insider.

Five years ago, van den Bussche experienced a period of burnout, where he realized that being the "key man," the face of the Kwebbelkop channel, was putting a lot of pressure on his ability to be present at work.

"It was a very hard realization to see that there's something you love doing, there's something you did as a hobby for so long, yet it can still weigh on you so much," he told Insider.

Van den Bussche, 28, persevered with putting some content out on his channel, but he also began working on ideas for how he could alleviate the pressure and create an online legacy that wouldn't rely so heavily on his own presence in videos.

In early August, the YouTuber launched his own alter-ego, "Kwebbelkop AI," a cartoon-style avatar mimicking Van den Bussche's voice and actions that has begun featuring in gaming videos on his behalf.

Van den Bussche says he no longer plans to show his real face in YouTube videos, a move which has so far received a somewhat mixed response. But he's confident it will catch on.

If it works, the YouTuber's AI avatar could ensure his lasting legacy

Van den Bussche told Insider the goal of "Kwebbelkop AI" was for it to successfully capture the "essence of an influencer." He wanted the AI to be able to emulate his online persona and behave just as he would on camera.

In an interview with WIRED, Van den Bussche explained that "Kwebbelkop AI" currently utilizes two versions of an AI tool. One has been trained to understand the YouTuber's typical behavior in videos and another uses prompts to help put videos together.

Van den Bussche, who has been building "Kwebbelkop AI" from scratch alongside a team of coders, now has 10 staff members who work on the tool full-time and are continuing to develop it. He declined to disclose specific details about how it works but said his team is still planning to roll out developments over the month of August.

He told Insider that he hopes that by the end of the month, the AI tool will be "fully autonomous," meaning it can play games, incorporate sound design, and edit videos, all on the creator's behalf.

Since the launch of "Kwebbelkop AI," Van den Bussche says he spends most of his time working with his team of programmers on improving his AI software, as opposed to filming traditional gaming content. Though he has been playing games on camera since he was 17, he said he doesn't miss the old way of doing doings.

"I love producing stories, but I don't necessarily always want to be involved in these videos," he told Insider.

The creation of "Kwebbelkop AI" will hopefully create a legacy for his YouTube channel that will far outlast him, he said, as he thinks the AI will be able to produce content for his brand even after his death.

"I think Kwebbelkop has become much bigger than me as an individual," he said, adding, "I have employees who have families and everything, and I do not want to have that pressure on my shoulders, or I do not want to be the person who results in everyone losing their jobs or their livelihoods."

Not all his viewers have reacted positively

The first Kwebbelkop video starring Van den Bussche's AI alter ego was uploaded on August 2, igniting a debate among hundreds of commenters who weighed in with their thoughts on the new development.

Some people expressed shock at how advanced the tool appeared to be, but others were more cynical, saying they felt using artificial intelligence to produce videos was a lazy alternative to the YouTuber filming them himself. Others appeared to miss seeing the YouTuber, lamenting the loss of the "old" Kwebbelkop.

Van den Bussche told Insider that he anticipated some initial skepticism, but believes the critics are ultimately a minority of viewers, as he has not seen a drop in subscribers that might signal that his fanbase is broadly unhappy.

He told Insider that developing the AI tool has involved a lot of hard work and innovation from himself and his team and that he is pleased with how the launch has gone, as well as how the AI represents his personality in videos.

"I've dedicated the last few years to this project, where I'm like, this couldn't be more me," he said.

He added that he is confident his AI-produced videos will only get more and more entertaining over time, as his team makes more tweaks and improvements.

The YouTuber said producing successful YouTube videos is "more of a science than people think it is," saying that the common idea that people watch YouTubers for a sense of personal connection to the individual is an "absolute illusion."

He told Insider that in his own experience, videos where he has previously filmed himself and disclosed personal information have not necessarily outperformed videos that were less personal but were "highly optimized for viewer satisfaction," such as some of his gaming videos which he's planned using audience data to keep viewers engaged for as long as possible.

Instead of pursuing more of a sense of connection to his fanbase, he says he believes that developing his AI tools will ultimately create possibilities for more creativity and views.

He described the situation as the gradual unveiling of a new invention, which is bound to create more excitement as more information about the product is revealed: "OK, so I just showed you the tire of the first car and everyone's like, 'wow, a tire, that's so cool.' Wait till you see the car. It's gonna be crazy."

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