When it comes to the matter of starting down the rabbit hole, I suppose I would have to start at the very beginning. Like others here, Kizuna Ai was my first interaction with v-tubing, though I must admit a most embarrassing fact; I legitimately thought she was an artificial intelligence. I had absolutely no idea software and hardware had existed that allowed people to effectively mocap like that outside of some multi-million dollar studio. In all honesty, this was mostly the pull for me, so when I learned it was an actual actress behind the avatar, I slowly dropped her over time.
For whatever reason, v-tubers really didn't pop up on my radar for years afterwards, even back during the early days of hololive. I did perk up a bit when I heard about Sakura Miko and Uruha Rushia saying
nigga~ during their GTA V streams, both doing it in a very pleasantly musical fashion I might add, but I didn't feel encouraged enough to watch more than whatever clips hit my recommended. I guess for the most part I was content with traditional streaming, and I hadn't a need to really look beyond the confines of Twitch. Things changed however when hololive EN dropped last year, and I found myself very much enamored with Gawr Gura, both in terms of her design, voice, and humor. Her content had really helped me through some rough points during last semester.
I dropped off for a bit during the winter months but came back in full force in January, especially around the time that 4chan added /vt/, a board specifically for v-tubers after being "exiled" from /jp/. To finally have a place in which I could shoot the shit and discuss v-tubers really helped improve my interest in it overall. For a couple months, I basically spent a bunch of my online time dicking around here and having a (mostly) good time. Also, reintegrating with KiwiFarms a couple months ago and recently learning that there was a pleasant megathread for v-tubers there also helped matters. It's a different environment for sure, but it has a lot of the same appeals of being a community where you can largely speak your mind, even more so than 4chan when you consider how bad the jannies are there. No, I'm not bitter.
Anyway, as I became more familiar with the genre, I started engaging more and more with the other talents, extending a bit towards the JP ones in particular such as Inugami Korone and Kiryu Coco. Naturally, as I am nowhere near fluent in Japanese, I would have to stick to subtitled clips or the rare occasions in which the girls would speak English, but I still enjoyed the material all the same. I would have to say Amano Pikamee in particular, a fellow open enthusiast of cunny, is one of the easiest JP v-tubers to watch due to her tendency to conduct bilingual (EN-JP) streams.
And now here we are. If I'm being honest, I am keeping up with v-tubers much less these days. I've more or less stopped visiting /vt/ since originality has really taken a nose dive while mindless antiposting is at an all-time high. I'm also a bit too shy to step into the KF thread much besides dropping reactions here and there, so my opportunities to congregate and discuss v-tubing have been limited to say the least.
To answer the question of "why" I like v-tubers, I need to go no further than their ultimate identity; they are the intersection between traditional streaming and anime characters. I find a lot of the things I don't like about streaming are absent when it pertains to v-tubers, and similarly they are much more animated and dynamic comapred to anime characters which are fixed in script and scope. Despite it being a potentially horrendous combination, v-tubing has proven to be an ultimate marriage between the two, taking mostly merits from both and shedding a lot of the flaws. It also helps that many of the personalities behind the avatars themselves are real people with real personalities, most of them entertaining and worth watching. I typically don't like to look too far into the "roommate", but for some of the ones I have, it's great to see that they have some sort of outlet and are able to not only appeal to an audience of fans but also find both professional and social fulfillment in their work. Just one of those cozy, comfy feelings, and this is one big motivation to follow and support my preferred talents. It really does matter, despite what the naysayers or doomposters might assert.
Another thing worth mentioning is all the content that v-tubers will into existence, be it of their own creation or by inspiring others. The content from streams is one thing, and it's certainly to be appreciated, but there's also the memes, music, and artwork that's being churned out so frequently. Hell, I would go so far to say that this is how I predominantly experience and consume this sort of content. V-tubing truly is an industry on its own, and it's just surprising that something so seemingly niche is able to add so much to the world.
Thus ends my blogpost. I am done, thank you forever.
TL;DR: I like it when the cute anime girl says the meme phrase and does the funny thing.