Are questions about VOCALOID allowed?

Question

Original Question on Area51

Background Info

VOCALOID (ボクロイド) is an English and Japanese (and recently Spanish, Chinese and Korean) voice synthesizer. The anime-inspired characters come with a 'voice' included in the software, which allows them to sing diverse songs created by anyone, with no limits to the pitch or tone of the singer's voice. Hatsune Miku (初音ミク CV01), the most well-known Vocaloid - hitting Japan by storm in earlier years - has even made her way to the Top 50 Music Charts in Japan. She has released over 100,000 songs in her short life with countless different producers. It has evolved so much, that 2-hour-long concerts have been showed in Japan, America and England, as well as several other countries with the character projected onto a screen or using holographic imagery. On Nico Nico Douga, a popular Japanese version of YouTube (if you will) artists have made MVs (music videos) and PVs (picture videos) as well as MMD (MikuMikuDance - another software developed because of VOCALOID) videos, which as an animation - usually dancing and singing. Also in YouTube, many people have watched the PVs and MMD videos, and over 18,000,000 views have been counted on the live version of Hatsune Miku's World is Mine (ワールドイズマイン) song. On Fanfiction.net, a dedicated category was opened for the use of writing about the VOCALOIDs and many have been written. Hatsune Miku, Kagamine Rin/Len and Megurine Luka - from Crypton Future Media - will all be apart of the Vocaloid 3 collection using the latest YAMAHA software, and Hatsune Miku will also have an English voicebank. Luka, Rin and Len's V2 versions already have English compatibility. Other VOCALOIDs include:

From the V1 series

• Meiko (Japanese)
• Kaito (Japanese)
• Miriam (English)
• Leon (English)
• Lola (English)

From the V2 series

• Hatsune Miku CVO1 (初音ミク CV01) (Japanese)
• Kagamine Rin/Len CVO2 (鏡音リン・レン CV02) (Japanese)
• Megurine Luka CV03 (巡音ルカ CV03) (Japanese)
• Sweet Ann (English)
• Prima (English)
• Plus +18 more

From the V3 series

• SeeU (시유) (Korean)
• Oliver (English)
• IA (Japanese)
• Bruno (Spanish)
• Clara (Spanish)
• +13 more and more to come (including CV01, CV02 and CV03 Vocaloid3 releases)

Topic

Because of the fact the characters are 'anime', they are Japanese (mostly), and MV with anime art in them that could be considered a movie with the subtitles/lyrics. Some series have 8+ songs in them with about 8 minutes length such as the 'Akuno(悪ノ)(Evil Of) Series'.

Would the new Anime and Manga site be open to questions related to this? For example:

Q1: VOCALOID: In Servant of Evil (悪ノ召使) by Kagamine Len, why is Rin holding a glass flask at the end of the PV?

Q2: VOCALOID: Are Kagamine Rin and Len officially twins?

Q3: VOCALOID: Who is Hatsune Miku's Voice actress?

Cheers.

Notes:

Sources and more information can be found below:

Hatsune Miku's Wikipedia page and Wiki Page, Vocaloid 1, 2 and 3 Wiki pages, Hatsune Miku's Manufacturer's website, Saki Fujita's Wikipedia Page, Vocaloid Wiki, Hatsune Miku's Toyota Corolla Campaign and her official YouTube channel

_{The answer to Q1 is generally up to how you interoperate it - however the answer is because of the link to the next song 'Message in a Bottle'. The answer to Q2 is no. They are officially termed as 'mirror images'. The Answer Q3 is Saki Fujita. CV stands for 'Character Voice', V1, 2 and 3 mean Vocaloid1, 2, and 3.}

Answer 1

As Martin Sojka suggested, I agree that questions about using the Vocaloid program do not belong here.

However, besides the fact that Vocaloids are part of otaku culture, they are also starting to see their share of manga[1][2][3] and soon even a full-length TV anime[1]. These are just "official" examples, but I have no doubt that even more doujin examples exist. I believe Vocaloid works in themselves are simply another form of doujin works, and questions related to their plots, stories, characters, etc. should be allowed here.

Allowed:

• Why does time keep resetting in Kagerou Days?
• How are Hatsune Miku and Akita Neru related?
• Has it ever been officially stated which Kagamine twin is older?

Not allowed:

• How can I make the Vocaloid program make this kind of sound?
• Where can I download Vocaloid CDs for free? (for legal reasons)
• Which Vocaloid sings this song? (allowing these could open up the possibility of thousands of questions just asking the same thing for different songs; it is probably better suited for chat)

Answer 2

Questions related to the use of the software fit very nicely on the Audio-Video Production SE site.

Works produced with the help of the software are fit for this site if they are anime works - that is generally, animated videos produced in Japan or by a Japanese company or individuals. Border cases will exist, but those are to be determined by further "Is this anime?" questions on our meta. In such a case, there's no point in singling out that they are VOCALOID-related questions. The site deals primarily with the end products, not with the tools used to create them.

Non-anime works created using this software are off-topic here, though they may be on-topic for Movies and TV (when used in life-action or non-anime animated works), Arqade (when used for computer game voices), Science Fiction and Fantasy (for non-anime works from these genres using the voices) and similar content-related SE sites.

Answer 3

I think we have to ask the question: Do these characters exist in any Anime or Manga?, and answer accordingly based on that, referring to material outside of the anime/manga if it's needed to better answer the question.

An appropriate Western animation analogy would be Izzy, the 1996 Atlanta Olympics mascot -- questions about Izzy or olympic mascots in general would be inappropriate, but questions about the one-shot animated special Izzy's Quest for Olympic Gold would be fair game, and questions about Izzy's design within the special could then use information about Izzy in general in order to answer the question.