Talk:Hatsune Miku/@comment-2600:6C54:7900:ADB:80FB:B63A:2A71:81AA-20181019195334/@comment-53539-20181023085920

Simple designs sometimes are a lot more effective then complex ones and its why they work. It was the theory of why some of the 90s video games worked or 80s cult classic cartoons worked. Sometimes over thinking a design can make it confusing to look at. I can remember in defence of the game Dark Stalkers... One of the things notable was they were designed so that which reduced to a silhouette, you still could tell who was who. That same theory applies to most pokemon as well in the original games. If all the Vocaloids are put in the "T-pose" silhouette you can identify Miku from the group. Some vocaloids like Luka or Meiko will be harder to spot without their colours, Luka will appear as a generic long haired girl and Meiko could be any short haired. You would be looking at minor design details that would make them stand out. But Miku's pigtails are unique only to her, same with Rin's bow. When there was the whole "Ring Suzune looks like Miku" stuff going on back in the day, this was the thing people couldn't understand in places like VO forums. A design is based on a formula thats often built up over time and re-used or referenced constantly, several Vocaloids borrow ideas from Miku because she is the most popular... But SF-A2 miki, Sonika, Big Al, etc are not clones of Miku. Heck, you can look at SeeU and see it, especially as one of her concept art has the V2 Miku boxart pose so its obvious she was copying aspects of Miku's design. In the end my argument to this is to say no Vocaloid is copying each other is to dismiss that a Vocaloid doesn't look like a Vocaloid, because the first thing that pops into most fans head are the likes of the Character Voice series designs Miku, Rin, Len and Luka. So people think "Vocaloid = Miku" and thats a Vocalod to them. There is a very good video that MovieBob once did explaining why formulas work and why sometimes companies are afraid to experiment with the unknown. :-?

https://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/the-big-picture/5746-Stone-Soup

While I don't subscribe to some of MovieBob's ideas, this video pretty much hits the nail on the head of why things work. Technically, Miku is just re-using the Sailor Moon trope of design, but its a design that is known to work.

Vocaloid is a HQ product alone, but using Sonika... Its true... ITs very hard to love Sonika and her quality is notable to be bad. Big Al has his quarks and Tonio has his glitches, and Prima with Tonio are both hard to use because of style. But all 3 are good enough to use and some of their flaws are common in V2 Vocaloids. Sonika has flaws unique to Sonika and those flaws are a pain to use. Going from her mumbling most of her lines to hitting that sweet spot she is clear is bad, because you adjust the entire song for mumble and that sharp clear range she does have (which is about 4 notes) throws it all off. Its easy to dismiss Sonika as complete trash for this reason... ITs why people say she can't English well. But the thing is... Out of all the V2's her English itself is actually about as good as V2 got and thats not a lie, so people who say she can't English well actually are spreading a lie. Sadly, it doesn't make up for the rest of the voice, but thats the 1 thing she got right and there are simply words she can say no other Engloid in V2 could. But you see how easy it is to aint a completely grim picture right? This is basically "bias" and the Vocaloid fandom is very good at it. Same thing that causes entire parts of the Vocaloid franchise to be dismissed, such as Korean hate, Spanish and Japanese love, and the treading of English quality. But it can work against Vocaloids outside of the Big 8, some vocaloids like Mirai get views as minor or side characters while Miku and co get viewed as "Main characters" when there is no such thing in Vocaloid. In 8 years, I've seen all sorts of things. :-?

One of the reasons I started to have a go at people back in 2010 was... Well... Its okay for veteran fans such as myself, Viper, Bunai, etc to say stuff... But... We have an impression on newbies as we appear to know what we're talking about. In 2010 when the VO form'ers were sprouting out things, they basically were giving my generation of fans all sorts of bad perceptions. I for a long time didn't realise how bad Gumi actually was, though I knew Miku was obviously bad. In fact its not until Megpoid V3 we were openingly told how bad Gumi was. Its easy to do. I grew suspicious though straight away and was sceptical of a lot being said, thats the only reason I didn't subscribe to that. But I was... 27 years old I think at the time. Not a random 13 year old kid who would be easier to give ideas to. I actually told off someone, forget who, in 2012 for this stuff because they just spouting nonsense all the time. You can't just spouting out things because you believe something is bad because you've heard no good songs. You need to bother with research or you just get caught. I quote the classic case of veteran fan Crossfrowne not realising Lola and Leon were soul singers, they promoted Blonde haired Leon and pop singer style avatars for Leon and Lola fans still use today. But it was the incorrect image and we know now that their singers were black. This was stated in a interview in 2009; but in those days no fans did the research and the Wikipedia and wikia here were crap.

Bare in mind in 2010 I was begging the likes of Crossfrowne to make the pages better for this reason and all refused on VO forums. I only am here because I rewrote a lot of stuff. I owe everyone else at the wikia a lot because we've grown as a wiki over time. I think the wiki would be lost without Bunai to code things and staff like Viper to monitor it. It takes a community effort, but in 2010... Well... the Vocaloid fans enjoyed mocking the clueless newbies and making an example of them. We do have a similar topic, but its not for mocking. I used to use VOs topic for finding all the weaknesses of fans beyond VO and trying to research. But that was the issue.

Anyway, I can speak a lot on that 1 topic... ITs a bitter memory since I should have by all rights left this fandom over it in 2012. Most of this stuff has since been dismissed such as the claims no other Vocaloid sounds alike and so fourth. Which just goes to show how clueless we as fans can be. As I said to Ruby's provider on Twitter, I can only base my own knowledge on what has been said. So if the studios feed the fans the wrong information, its repeated by veterans like me and thats bad. If your aware of the Flat Earth moment in the last 3 years, one of the comments said about it our perception of things can easily be fooled. If we believe our eyes then is this a picture of a young or old woman?

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-11/ageism-tested-with-classic-optical-illusion/10231710

Likewise in Vocaloid, our ears are easy to fool. Some producers are really good at working with Vocaloids, therefore we can not even realise their flaws. Our ears can be deceived entirely and Vocaloid itself is one of those products playing with the uncanny valley. If a veteran fan is telling you some stuff like in 2010, and your ears believe them since they can't hear things, then you'll think their right.

In the end, I honestly don't think it matters, knowing it at least gives you food for thought. a lot of the Vocaloid fans we find only are into Vocaloid for about 104 years and they move on. Especially teenagers I'm afraid. So for likes of Viper, Bunai and others such as myself to stick around, we have carried knowledge of the things those who visit us for a year don't. Knowledge of drama in the fandom, and we tend to speak from joy and sadness. For Vocaloid, some things you learn over time like facts on how good/bad Miku was in V2. Others... You pick up randomly and may not be related, I learnt from research related to Vocaloid for example that after about 100,000 vocalists there is no difference in the way something sounds. So 500,000 singers in theory are no different to 100,000... Nothing to do with Vocaloid, I just picked it up. I admit though, I enjoy learning about this stuff most of all.