[gentooflux]

There's meet-ups and conferences and events, being a fan of a streamer or influencer is really just the new version of being a fan of a rockstar (for better and for worse). There's no real humanity exuding from an Amazon Echo, you're just a blip in a context window.

[WesolyKubeczek]

Streamers have this feature called "chat", which feeds into the illusion. With rockstars, interactions are more limited, which is a sort of reality check.

[gentooflux]

Rockstar interactions with young female fans are not as limited as you say. Regardless, celebrity worship is far from a new societal problem. Confiding with the toaster as though it grew up with you sure is.

[WesolyKubeczek]

Oh, forgot about that one. However, note that it's also "parasocial" in the way that the young female fans think the musicians care about them more than they actually do, by orders of magnitude.