Hikaru Kaihatsu (開發 光, Kaihatsu Hikaru, born April 21, 1989), professionally known as Hikakin (Japanese: ヒカキン), is a Japanese YouTuber and businessman who is the co-founder of UUUM,[2] a Japanese multi-channel network. He is also a member of the Japanese music group Hikakin & Seikin. A video of his Super Mario Bros. beatbox went viral in 2010, reaching over 3.8 million views by mid-September of that year.[3][4] He, alongside fellow Japanese YouTuber Megwin, quit their day jobs in 2012 to focus entirely on their channels.[5][6] He also collaborated with Gille, appearing in her promotions for her single "Try Again", where it is stated that he is one of the most popular Japanese YouTubers.[7]
After studying at Myōkōkōgen Minami Elementary School (later Myoko City) and Myoko Junior High School (present Myoko Municipal Myoko Junior High School), he entered Niigata Prefectural Arai High School. In March, he graduated from Niigata Prefectural Arai High School and went to Tokyo. Many of the supermarkets in Tokyo were from Niigata Prefecture, and they made a living working at Yoshiike [ja], a Japanese supermarket that happened to have a job opening for a high school.[9] Moreover, at that time I had no bank account of my own, so I had no savings, and went up to Tokyo with only 20,000 yen from his parents. The supermarket where he worked had a company dormitory and the rent was deducted from his monthly salary, so he didn't have to worry about finding a place to live.[10]
Career
2006-2008: Opening a YouTube channel
He opened his own official channel "HIKAKIN" on YouTube in December 2006. He originally started the service to watch videos of overseas beatboxers, but he thought that if he posted his own videos, people would watch them, so he started posting videos.[11] He started posting videos soon after opening the site, but since he deleted it himself, very few videos from that time remain. The oldest extant video is a beatbox he filmed in his home bathroom in 2007 (he was a high school senior at the time).[12] In 2015, a remake version of this beatbox video, "2015 ver.'', was posted, which was shot in the same environment and clothing as at the time.[13] Since then, I've been recording a number of beatbox videos using a cheap microphone in the bathroom of the company dormitory or in my room at night, carefully selecting the ones that I thought were good, and uploading one or two videos a month.
He once applied to become a YouTube partner (a system for earning advertising revenue), but was rejected at the time. After that incident, he began to think, "I'll do it so that I can get offers from the YouTube side," and began to make videos from the viewer's point of view.[14] Although nothing major happened for about two years after his arrival in Tokyo, the number of views gradually increased, and the most popular video at the time had about 200,000 views. At the time, YouTube was still not well known in Japan, and most of the views were from overseas, with only about 10-20% coming from Japan.[15]
2009-2014: Rise to Fame
In 2010, he uploaded "Super Mario Beatbox", a beatbox medley of background music from the "Super Mario Bros". This video recorded the No. 1 access on YouTube for the month in Japan and was featured in the top news story of "CBS News" in the United States.[16] After recording 200,000 hits 24 hours after uploading the video and 1 million hits a week later, Hikakin received an offer from YouTube to become a YouTube partner,[14] He said that he thought, "I have YouTube even when customers get angry at me in the supermarket or my boss gets sarcastic with me. Furthermore, he was selected as one of the top 500 best YouTube partners in the world in 2010[17] and won the "WOW Star Project 2010" and was invited to Las Vegas.[18] These events led to a gradual increase in requests to perform live and on TV shows as a performer.
In June 2011, the YouTube Partner Forum was held in Japan. At the time, he did not even have the idea of posting videos for a living, but meeting American YouTuber Michelle Phan at this event and being impressed by her speech was a turning point, and he began posting videos in earnest.[19] Later, an opportunity presented itself when a contest called "YouTube NextUp 2011" was held, with 10 winners and a prize of 2 million yen. At the time, he had the largest number of channel subscribers in Japan, and people around him thought he would be accepted. He entered the contest with the confidence that he could quit his job and concentrate on YouTube, but he was not selected.[20] After this humiliating setback, he sought advice from Tomohiro Sato, who works as an advisor to YouTubers. There, he received a handbook outlining the basics of video creation and lots of individual advice. On his own, he studied videos by top creators in Japan and abroad, and imitated their editing skills, such as titles and thumbnails. After about three months of doing so, he realized that his income from YouTube exceeded his company employee's salary.[21]
In December 2012, Hikakin released his first album, a collaboration with video game musiccomposerHideki Sakamoto, for the soundtrack of the Echannel drawing application of the PlayStation Vita. In May 2013, Hikakin participated in the Social Star Awards and the subsequent Singapore Social concerts, performing with Aerosmith during their stage set and beatboxing before performing with the band on "Walk This Way".
In February 2014, Hikakin did a collaboration beatbox video with American singer Ariana Grande, beatboxing to her song "Baby I".
In October 2014, Hikakin was one of the performers for the first YouTube FanFest in Tokyo, Japan. At the same YouTube FanFest, Japanese breakbeat music duo Hifana performed with their instruments and using Hikakin's beatbox broken down into several parts, they created a new combination of his beatboxing and their instruments.
In December 2014, Hikakin went to New York City to do another collaboration video with Ariana Grande, doing a beatbox of that song, while she was singing "Break Free". In the same month, Hikakin uploaded a beatbox video that featured American singer Ne-Yo. They performed Ne-Yo's song "Coming with You" and his famous 2007 hit "Because of You".
2015-2020: Mainstream success
Hikakin in 2015
On August 14, 2015, he released "YouTube Theme Song" which was produced in collaboration with YouTube's older brother Seikin. Taking this opportunity, he began to produce music as "HIKAKIN & SEIKIN."[22] The song reached number 78 on the Billboard Japan Hot 100. As of 2024, it has surpassed 100 million views, which is by far the most viewed video on HikakinTV.[23]
On April 10, 2020, Hikakin met with Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike. As of 2024, it has been viewed approximately 11 million times and has received 450,000 positive reviews. The meeting was made possible by Governor Koike responding to Hikakin's suggestion. It's not meant to be monetized and can be viewed ad-free, making it easy to spread.[26]
On May 21, 2020, in order to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, he established the "Coronavirus Medical Support Fund" in partnership with Yahoo! Japan.[27] At the event, Hikakin donated 100 million yen (about $690,000).[27] Celebrities also contributed, including Japanese businessperson Yusaku Maezawa,[28] and soccer player Yuto Nagatomo,[29] who said he would donate all proceeds from YouTube videos he posted during the fundraising period. In the end, from May 21 to June 30, 216,295 people donated, bringing the total to about 370 million yen (about $2.55 million).[30]
On December 8, 2020, it was ranked No. 1 in the "Domestic Annual Top Trending Ranking" announced by YouTube official.[31]
2021-present: Surpass 10 million subscribers
His channel kept growing consistently since then, and it hit 9 million subscribers on April 8, 2021.[32] He set 10 million subscribers as the next goal. When his HikakinTV channel marked the 10th anniversary, he announced that he is going to post 10 videos with extra effort, from August 1 to 20. It has an official playlist. Additionally, he changed his intro animation to the one which he encourages himself to reach the goal and celebrates HikakinTV's 10th anniversary.[33]
At 12:11 on September 10, 2021, the number of subscribers to his YouTube channel "HikakinTV" surpassed 10 million. On the day of the event, he made a live broadcast, and at the moment he reached the milestone, he was so moved that he cried.[34] The 10 million live record includes 130,000 more channel subscribers in about 10 minutes, 160,000 simultaneous connections, about 7.5 million views in the first five days of video release, and a total superchat amount of $3 million raised in about 10 minutes, ranking the channel number one worldwide in YouTube's superchat rankings for channels worldwide.
He have opened 5 channels on YouTube, and as of April 2023, the total number of subscribers for all channels is approximately 20 million, the total number of views has reached approximately 18 billion, and we are ranked 6th in Japan. The "Bzz bzz'' in his video greeting, "Bzz bzz, hello YouTube, this is Hikakin," is a nod to the American beatboxer Rahzel. He says that his fan base is mainly elementary and junior high school students, and he wants to create content that the whole family can watch while having a meal.[36] The origin of the name Hikakin is that his senior ski jumper from 3rd grade to 3rd year of high school started calling him Hikakin, a twist of his real name.[37] He asked his senior why he was called "Kin'', but he was not told, so the meaning remains unclear. When he was in junior high school, he posted beatboxing sounds on bulletin boards under the name HIKAKIN, and the name gradually spread, so it stuck.[38]
Reception
Hikakin at the YouTube Japan 2019 FanFest
As of 2024, there have been no major scandals and social trust is extremely high.[39] Many of his videos are moderate, and there are extremely few scandals. He is also known as "Flameless'', and when the scandals of other popular YouTubers are reported, his relative reputation increases and he is even called a "saint''.[40] Even if he did get flamed, most of it was minor, and on the contrary, the voices of his defense were louder.[41] In addition, in 2015 and 2020, false rumors were spread by viewers and caused a stir, and Hikakin posted two videos at the time to clear up misunderstandings.
On the other hand, in a live commentary video of Apex Legends that was uploaded on July 12, 2022, he repeatedly yelled abusive words at an ally player on the same team, and in the comments section, he exposed the player's name and said, "If you find this annoying, please press the good button.'' As a result of the post, he was flooded with criticism on social media and became a hot topic. On the 19th of the same month, he deleted the aforementioned comment and apologized in the comments section. On August 13, he called her directly in a video to apologize and report that they had reconciled.[42] At first, he expected that the comment section of the video would be filled with criticism of the other party, but in reality, he himself was criticized, and he apologized, saying, "It was all my fault.''
According to Noko, the frontman of Shinsei Kamattechan, who is an old friend, he describes his personality as "There is no other person who is so open-minded.'' He is kind to everyone from an ordinary person's point of view, and doesn't care about profit or loss. He says he is a person who can take action. The first time I met him was at a party hosted by Takafumi Horie in 2013, and when he told me that his goal at the time was "I want to exceed the number of subscribers on a corporate channel,'' he said, "Normally, if I were to see him as a rival, I wouldn't have to be an individual.'' "Isn't it? It's amazing that the other party was a company."[43]Hiroyuki Nishimura, the founder of 2ch, said during the 2021 banquet scandal involving multiple YouTubers, "I've been saying from time to time that "personality'' is what is needed to do well on YouTube in the long term, but it is important to properly handle situations like this. It's amazing how Hikakin is avoiding him...''[44]
Takafumi Horie describes his impression of Hikakin as "an ordinary child." He also said, "There aren't many people who are popular on the internet who are very pushy, and even though they weren't really outstanding during their school days, they're just average people. So it's just as I expected."[45]
HIKAKIN PREMIUM
HIKAKIN PREMIUM is an original brand established by Hikakin. The brand is managed by P2C Studio (a UUUM subsidiary) as a joint effort between Hikakin and UUUM Inc.[46] As the first step in the establishment of the brand, they sell cup noodles and cup rice as well as T-shirts as commemorative products.[47]
Background
Continuing to support my humble beginnings, they gave me ramen.
The day my life changes,
I was eating ramen.
Then I thought about it
It's an invigorating food.
On April 21, 2023, the day of his 34 year birthday, he announced that he would suspend all activities, including social media, for a week. He released a video titled "I will take a break from activities for the first time" on his channel HikakinTV.[49]
As a final preparation to realize the dream of his original brand, HIKAKIN PREMIUM, he took a break for the first time since he started activities.[50] On April 27 of the same year, she announced the reason for her suspension in a video together with a special video she made.[51]
On May 9, 2023, HIKAKIN PREMIUM launched its first cup ramen, “Misokin Rich Miso Ramen, ” and cup rice,“ Misokin Rich Miso Meshi, ” which garnered attention on social media.[52]Nissin Food Products Co., Ltd. was in charge of manufacturing the products, and sales began at Seven-Eleven stores throughout Japan.[53]
Impact
It was reported that it was sold out on the first day of the release, "Misokin sold out" became a trending topic on X (formerly Twitter), and posters titled "Apology" were posted at each store. Hikakin was so influential that they released a video on the day of the release.[54] There were also reports of high-value resale at Mercari.
On May 29, 2023, Hikakin uploaded a video titled "After a lot of discussions with related parties, it was decided that we could… resell the misokin!" in which they reported that "I am happy to report that I can resell it!".[55] Resale was scheduled to be around the middle of August 2023,[56] and limited quantities were sequentially released at Seven-Eleven on August 10.[57] This time around, some stores also restricted purchases.[58] In the following year, 2024, it was resold on May 25 and 30th.[59]
Personal life
In July 2018, he adopted a male Scottish Fold cat, "Maruo", and in September, he adopted Maruo's brother, "Mofuko". He has always liked cats since he was a child, and he had been thinking about getting one for a year.[60]
His brother, Seikin, born 30 July 1987 is also a YouTuber with more than 4.6 million subscribers.[61]
On January 1, 2024, Hikakin announced his marriage on his channel.[62] On August 1 of the same year, he announced the birth of his first child on his official YouTube channel. Hikakin revealed that he and his wife were already expecting when he made his marriage announcement earlier in January. However, he refrained from announcing their pregnancy at the time, as he felt that it would be a burden to his wife both mentally and physically.[63]
Publications
Single author
My work is YouTube (僕の仕事はYouTube, Boku no shigoto wa YouTube) (July 19, 2013, Housewife and Lifesha) ISBN978-4391143799
How to make a YouTuber loved by 4 million people (400万人に愛されるYouTuberのつくり方, 400mannin ni aisareru YouTuber no tsukurikata) (October 30, 2014, Nikkei BP) ISBN978-4822220792
^In, Natasha. "HIKAKINが第1子の誕生を報告「守るものが増えたので今まで以上に頑張ります」（動画あり）" [HIKAKIN announces the birth of his first child: "I'll work harder than ever because I now have more things to protect"]. Natalie (in Japanese). Retrieved 2024-08-06.
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