About the Subreddit

r/Vocaloid is a subreddit for the community of the voice synthesizing software, VOCALOID, made by Yamaha. This is where the well-known virtual idol Hatsune Miku hails from.

Before the NSFW Rule Change

r/Vocaloid was discussing about the controversy surrounding Hiiragi Magnetite's song "Zako," a song about a child "bullying" the listener in a suggestive way using Kaai Yuki (which is voiced by a 9 year old), in which people witch hunted Hiiragi Magnetite to the point of privating the music video and apologizing in public. Said discussions spawned slapfights amongst the community.

Here's some comments and replies under some posts regarding the discussion.

Some agreed that using Kaai Yuki for the song left a bad taste on the Vocaloid community

honestly they couldve just used another character like miku or teto for the song and that would fix like 90% of its issues

shouldve used a vocaloid other than kaai yuki

Exactly, like this song would have been okay if it literally didn't use a vb that was voice acted by a minor 😭 Ofc the entire lolibait thing still sucks but at least it wouldn't literally break the TOS of Yuki's vb 💀

Kaai Yuki is one of like, 6 voicebanks that literally was voiced by a child and is only ever depicted as a child. 90 percent of ppl here are agreeing with the sentiment that a sexual song doesn't matter but WHEN YOU'RE USING THE CHILD VOICEBANK, you need to accept that there are some things it's not socially acceptable to do. Miku was voiced by a full grown adult woman and her age has never once been treated like a solid fact, you know full well that is not an apt comparison.

I genuinely would not care if it didn't use the voice bank voiced by a REAL CHILD.

If it had been a normal song about a tsundere girl in love I would have been fine with it; but the fetishy undertones are there.

not the people in comments of the reupload ranting about "western snowflake tourists" 😭 get your ass off 4chan her vp was a literal 9 year old and yuki is presented as a child (and i'm saying this as a person who enjoys mimikauwa)

You know it's bad when even the mimukawa nice try fans found it's disgusting

While some defended it.

Yet another producer harassed out of sharing his art. Great job western vocaloid community! You know what? You idiotic teenagers win. I've been a vocaloid fan for 18 years, I just can't keep supporting a community that constantly harasses anyone that creates art they personally don't like. Vocaloid was created for the exact opposite purpose, it allowed anyone to create and share whatever they want. The fact that most of you are happy about this is honestly disgusting. Do you know how many OG Vocaloid art would be deleted if this same harassment existed back then? I've come to realize this community is a shell of its former self. Freedom of expression has been replaced by hate, sharing has been replaced by criticizing and praise has been replaced by harassment. There's been a hostile take over of vocaloid by western newcomers that don't understand anything. It's just sad.

American feelings Yakuza strikes again lul

It uses a real 9 year old’s voice bro

This is why gatekeeping is so important.

Thank god tbh - hope Hiiragi learnt his lesson

I hope to know you're a terrible person.

Western cultural colonization happened

I really don't get why people are hating on Hiiragi Magnetite tbh. Sure, the voice used is that of a 9 year old and it's got some sexual innuendos, but does that really matter? There are tons of western pop songs sung by kids that have sexual innuendos so what makes this one different? If anything the western pop songs like that are worse because the kids are the ones directly saying those words.

You're literally the type of person that mades the japan otaku/weeb industry not care about the western. I mean, you literally said that them, the providers of all the food you eat(figuratively) aren't that significant? I mean, it's like spitting on the plate you're eating lmao. Also, there's no real children silly, I mean, there WAS in 2009, but the time she provided the voices, she is not involved on ANYTHING, since a voicebank it's just a voicebank and no matter who provided it, the person using it can use it the way it wants to since they paid for it and they chose the one that sounded like they wanted to in that specific song.

On a minor note, another Vocaloid producer SAWTOWNE removed their video of "Mimukawa Nice Try," which had a similar premise to "Zako," but it's instead voiced by Hatsune Miku. This was posted on r/Vocaloid, and caused a minor version of the controversy surrounding "Zako."

Welp we're done. The angry mob of twittards have won. Sets a bad precedent for producers to remove songs to get away from backlash. Now I'm low-key scared for shikiura.

he made a what….. 🙁

The Change of the NSFW Rule.

A mod of the r/Vocaloid declared an update to the subreddit's rules, which say the following:

"Notable highlights include:

Prohibition on all NSFW content. This notably includes songs that deal with sexually suggestive themes, or discussion of said songs.

New rule on keeping things civil. If you see somebody acting incivil, do not engage, report it.

Additional rule about staying on topic, and what constitutes on topic. (This can be considered an extension/clarification of the quality content rule.)

Formal rule against AI content. (This was basically enforced already, but now it is a formal rule.)

Why these changes?

Over the last few weeks much of the discourse on this sub has turned nasty and gone off the rails. This is the first step in starting to rein that in.

The next step will be bringing on additional moderators. There have been several users who have pointed out in modmail or otherwise that most of the moderation team is inactive, and you are not wrong. If you think you might be interested, look for a post in the next few days.

In the meantime, please continue to report content that breaks the rules, and do not engage with those who are acting incivil."

Reactions to the Change

Many users within the r/Vocaloid community were enraged by the announcement of the rule change, most notably at the part where sexually suggestive songs are not allowed, and discussions about them are also included.

There is a post that says that if the NSFW rules don't change, the OP will make a derivative of the VOCALOID subreddit.

Comments have included the following:

be the change you want to see in the world! seriously though, I'd love a community that embraces calm nuanced discussion instead of devolving into a mess of name calling and assumptions. Especially if that means not banning something completly unrelated in the process

The mods should make a VocaloidSFW sub for the loud puritan minority

I think that would be a good choice actually, and should have been done a long time ago. Some people are not comfortable with NSFW, while other people a not comfortable if they can't share something that makes them happy.

I dont know, unless the subreddit would be strictly nsfw, i feel like that would just devolve into tribalism and cause a huge seperation in the community. The best thing is to wait until the mods revert the rule, or if that doesn't happen create an nsfw dedicated subreddit.

Another post tested this rule, to see if a song made by a highly-revered producer that tackles a sexually suggestive subject would get them banned.

Comments have included the following:

"The closer the collapse of a server, the crazier its laws are."

Mods, I'd be down with this post being taken down on the grounds of putting a stop to excessive controversy/drama discussion. Just think a flat ban on all things NSFW is stupid. (From OP himself)

The majority of the posts, however, have pointed out that a big amount of Vocaloid songs have tackled sexually suggestive topics, pedophilic or not, citing that it's an insult towards Vocaloid producers, and have said that the mods should've banned posts only relating "Zako," and not ban everything else that is NSFW.

The following posts will be mentioned:

this is a insult to vocaloid artists, i hope you know that, right?

Users commented under this post:

Yeah I'm a pretty old-time Vocaloid fan but I'm new to this site and this weekend's drama and the subsequent response made me realize this isn't the Vocaloid sub I thought it was.

No more talking about Neru music or wowaka music or kikuo music or deco*27 music or maretu music, etc. BYE!!! So much popular vocaloid music is NSFW. Yeah there’s a lot of producers but many popular ones (which are talked about more, just stating an obvious truth) create NSFW music.

Guess this is a Popipo only subreddit now

banning nsfw from a subbreddit about a medium of art

Users commented under this post:

Watching in real time as mods kill the sub from panic and stress thanks to a bunch of badly parented teens with zero emotional intelligence harassing people

I hate it when tourists try to push their values. If you don't like other cultures then kindly piss off. We like keeping communities open, but when there are too many loud whiners that's how gatekeeping and intra-community infighting happens. Ignore the loud minorities. Let them scream into the void and unblock NSFW. Keep Vocaloid weird and creative, unless you want to ban masterpieces like Panda Hero or Two-Faced Lovers.

NSFW ban will cause this sub to crash and burn.

Users commented under this post:

Come over to r/VocaloidButGood where we hope to build a more balanced and not forcibly sanitized community

That would've been manageable with a Zako megathread or something like that. If anything the latest vocaloid big events have been the channel Rabbit Hole miku, rotten girl and now this so we're going thru some nsfw vocaloid renaissance

Before they start muting discussions about the NSFW ban, message the mod mail with polite suggestions to simply ban drama farming/posting instead of NSFW so it doesn't kill the sub. I have a hunch some puritans flooding mod mail with requests from alt accounts to ban NSFW is what caused the ban in the first place.

More news will come as soon as updates come up.