Bilibili’s Smart Move To Create A Culture Of Collaboration And Reinvention

Now that people have more time on their hands, they can watch entire seasons of their favorite anime or tune in to their favorite streamers online without feeling guilty about it. There was a plethora of options, thanks to the growing demand for multimedia entertainment like anime and game live streaming. One of the best platforms out there is Bilibili.

Mr. Xu Yi established Bilibili in 2009 with the intention of creating a central gathering place for animation enthusiasts. Bilibili was inspired by the nickname given to A Certain Scientific Railgun’s main character, Mikoto Misaka and quickly gained a following among fans of anime, comics and video games. It also provides a platform, much like YouTube does, for individual content creators to share their work with the world.

We’re sure you’re still wondering what Bilibili is and how they hope to help creators in fields other than streaming anime, comics, and games. And here’s some good news: we were successful in getting you the answers you needed.

What sets Bilibili apart from platforms like YouTube and Tiktok, which are both geared toward the production and consumption of content, respectively?

There are mainly three differentiators:

• Our focus on the anime, comics and gaming (ACG). We consider ourselves hardcore ACG fans. We love this community and want to celebrate it. Born out of our shared passion, is Bilibili. What started out as a community inspired by our love for ACG has now beautifully transformed into a leading platform with the most expansive anime library. That said, we do aim to become a full-spectrum video platform in the long term and we are continuously expanding our content ecosystem.

• Bilibili is not just a platform. It’s a community of people with shared interests in ACG. We do not exist just to generate views. We want to create a space where these people can belong. Bilibili is about coming together and enjoying content with likeminded people who want to express their creativity, and connect with their community.

• We are a hybrid platform that hosts both long-form videos and short-form creator videos, and everything in-between. Apart from our massive anime collection, we also host creator’s videos to answer to the needs of the young generation who both love to “watch” as well as to “create” in one place. Bilibili builds its community around active users, high-quality content, talented creators and the strong emotional bond among them.

Is the Bilibili app only available to people who are interested in comics, anime, or video games specifically? Is it possible for musicians and other types of entertainers to upload content using the app?

If you explore our app, you’d easily find that all types of videos beyond ACG already exist on our platform, be it music, dancing, food, and vlogs.

And you can find fusion of different content categories. For example, rap is a genre of music not often associated with anime. But with the power of the Internet, globalization, and creativity of today’s youth, the mash-up of these two genres has carved out a fresh space for itself. On our platform, anime rap music is an emerging category that’s gaining momentum. And we embrace developments like this. We are an open and inclusive place.

Of course, ACG will always be in our DNA and remain our core identity. But Bilibili’s mission is to enrich the everyday life of the young generation, be it through ACG-videos and or other content categories. We aim to become a full-spectrum video platform in the long term and we are continuously expanding our content ecosystem.

The attitude of the Bilibili community has been generally upbeat; what factors contributed to this occurrence and encouraged members of the community to treat one another kindly? Does the Bilibili app have a moderation system that hides or deletes comments that are deemed to be negative?

Bilibili is not just a platform. It’s a community of people with shared love for ACG. When like-minded people gather, an upbeat community atmosphere is more likely to emerge.

In our community, we encourage inclusiveness and mutual respect. Community rules are in place and all users are encouraged to report comments that violate our community rules. We also have in place a moderation system against acts violating our community rules such as vulgarity, discrimination, violent content.

In the long run, how do you envision the Bilibili app expanding its functionality?

Our current priority is to continuously broaden and enrich our content ecosystem, provide support to our content creators so we could grow together with local creators and constantly upgrade our products based on our users’ and creators’ feedback.

We are a user-centric company. Therefore, our product innovations and functionality will be largely driven by local users’ feedback. For example, Bilibili recently launched a new line of Virtual Assets based on global hit manga and anime series Rent-a-Girlfriend. This new series of Virtual Assets, including a slew of brand-new app themes, stickers, avatar frames and background covers, aim to satisfy Bilibili users’ needs to customize their in-app experiences and better express themselves.

Is there anything the community should look forward to in the near future? Or possibly a preview of what’s to come in the following months?

The much-anticipated Fall 2022 anime releases! Bilibili has the largest anime inventory in Southeast Asia from latest releases to the classic titles everyone knows and loves. New anime episodes are released on a daily basis, genres including but not limited to action, adventure, comedy, fantasy, romance, school, sci-fi, sports and food.

One Piece Film: Red Watch Party: As One Piece Film: Red continues to gain momentum and win the hearts of One Piece fans across the world, Bilibili decides to host an offline watch party for our community in the Philippines in Oct. Bilibili users and video creators will be invited to join this adventure. More details will be revealed on our official social media accounts (Instagram, Facebook) Stay tuned!

The platform’s aspirational growth techniques have expanded its reach much beyond the original ACG market and acquired a dedicated following of users. The current users are mostly anime, comics, and gaming fans. Female/male ratio is about half and half with male % slightly higher than that of female. Most users are young – the majority of the users are under the age of 25. The users can be found in various areas in the Philippines, with over 25% in the Manila Metropolitan Area. So if you’re a someone who enjoys watching videos online, you should definitely check out Bilibili, a promising competitor in the market. Go to bilibili.tv or get the Bilibili app from the App Store or Google Play.