Sneak

today she gets cameos, collaborations, and sometimes voiced lines in anime and games, actual rhythm games featuring her and the other piapro 6, she’s the face of GoodSmile racing (and was very temporarily the face of Domino’s Pizza in America, even), dozens of figures are made for her every year, there’s how her songs have been the foundation for multiple multi-media franchises and IPs like Black Rock Shooter and KagePro, and she among other virtual singers get to hold actual physical concerts people attend to see her “live.”

but the way she spread and has become an online cultural fixture is almost entirely dependent on genuine effort from online communities and what I can’t help but describe as love. all this couldn’t have been possible without online producers like ryo of supercell and EGOIST fame, cosMo, OSTER project, and kz simply putting their songs on niconico where everyone can watch and listen to the music videos for free, without the huge help of the marketing that miku gets today.

songs like “Melt” from ryo and “Packaged” from kz were posted just because these producers wanted to share what they created with the world. and that music was shared more and more because people just really liked listening to them. these songs convinced and inspired other producers down the line that there was a way for their music to spread without being singers themselves and that using Vocaloids was entirely viable. producers like Mitchie-M and wowaka used miku in new, striking ways that were huge departures from the likes of supercell and kz. and this isnt even going into the fanartists and animators who drew and animated because they loved miku and her songs just that much.

ibara: girl (would be angry at being called “girl”, would insist upon being called lady or madame or mistress like some rich anime OHOHO girl)

yuta: girl (reluctantly accepts if called girl, but holds internal distain. will imagine spitting in ur food over it and silently steep in annoyance)