This is what happens when paganism hits advanced technology. Leave it to the Japanese to make a "goddess" come to life...
By James Verini
At a Hatsune Miku concert, that’s also the moment when the proceedings take a turn for the, well, the only precise way of saying it is for the Japanese. Miku is not human. She is a virtual idol, a holographic star. Miku is crowdsourced, ever-evolving, famous software. Not even her fans know, or care, how to taxonomize her. (“She’s rather more like a goddess: She has human parts, but she transcends human limitations. She’s the great posthuman pop star,” one fansite reads.) Her bandmates are all actual people playing real instruments, but Miku is projected onto the stage, singing, if that’s the word, in avian-robot trills. She was programmed to do this months before, thousands of miles away.
Not that her forecoded unreality interferes with widespread adoration. On the contrary, Miku is now one of the biggest acts in Asia—as popular in her native Japan as Sega’s iconic Sonic the Hedgehog. She has devotees beyond Japan too. Last November she gave a concert in Singapore, drawing 3,000 fans—only about half of them female, not all young. They sang along in Japanese, a language many of them didn’t speak. Some came dressed as Miku. Others waved Miku dolls to the beat. One girl watched a Miku video on her phone while a digitized Miku played in front of her.
Read more at - http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/10/mf-japan-pop-star-hatsune-miku/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Top+Stories%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher&pid=8265
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| When Cartoons Come To Life |
Photo: Joe Pugliese
A Hatsune Miku concert begins humanly enough. If you’ve ever had the heart to accompany a daughter or niece to, say, a Justin Bieber or Miley Cyrus extravaganza, you know the drill: The young crowd rushes in, giggling, making yelplike noises that adult throats don’t make, repeating the titles of songs as if they were mantras. The band emerges, followed by more young-throat noises, followed by the diminutive but eerily poised headliner, who recalls one of those grown-up-looking babies in Renaissance art. Followed by pubescent rapture.
Not that her forecoded unreality interferes with widespread adoration. On the contrary, Miku is now one of the biggest acts in Asia—as popular in her native Japan as Sega’s iconic Sonic the Hedgehog. She has devotees beyond Japan too. Last November she gave a concert in Singapore, drawing 3,000 fans—only about half of them female, not all young. They sang along in Japanese, a language many of them didn’t speak. Some came dressed as Miku. Others waved Miku dolls to the beat. One girl watched a Miku video on her phone while a digitized Miku played in front of her.
Read more at - http://www.wired.com/underwire/2012/10/mf-japan-pop-star-hatsune-miku/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wired%2Findex+%28Wired%3A+Top+Stories%29&utm_content=Google+Feedfetcher&pid=8265
