Starting around 2 weeks ago, many Vocaloid and even UTAUloid YouTube videos started disappearing at an alarming rate due to claims by unknown (and false) copyright holders. The result of course is terminated videos, and even accounts. From the looks of how widespread the problem is, it is suspected that an organized group is behind the activity.

It shouldn’t be too much longer before YouTube shuts down the false claims, but there is something you can do if you or someone you know has been affected.

Users can file a counter-claim against the copyright by going to this page: http://support.google.com/youtube/bin/request.py?hlrm=ja&contact_type=copyright_counternotice

Most users should see their videos returned with view count, ratings, and comments within a couple weeks.

The video below is one of the more popular trending videos on the situation.

Description:

Someone is deleting high ranked Miku Hatsune (and other VOCALOID) videos by filing false reports that the videos are infringing copyright.
If your video is deleted by a false report, please submit a counter-notification:
http://support.google.com/youtube/bin/request.py?hlrm=ja&contact_type=copyright_counternotice
In most cases, the videos will be restored in a few weeks with the views and comments in tact.
This video is free to reprint with translation.

In a matter of 12 hours, she’s moved from rank #91 to rank #39. If you want to take a look and cast a vote for yourself, you can do so here. This is a perfect opportunity to attract publicity from online readers.

Getting her into the top 10 will be difficult, but we’ll see what happens!

EDIT 1/13/2012 10:09PM: After a few message exchanges with the admins on their message board, Miku has been added back to the site!

If you wish to read the other edits to get an idea of what happened earlier, read the entire post.

Below is the previous edits from throughout the day.

UPDATE 01/13/2012 11:55 AM GMT-8: Just 10 minutes ago, Hatsune Miku’s name vanished from the list not long after reaching rank #22. I’ll try to look for updates or explanations for the removal. Let’s hope it’s just a glitch!

UPDATE 01/13/2012 1:13 PM: I have received a response from the admins of the site.

Because Hatsune Miku is not a person, we felt it was not appropriate for the list.

TheTopTens

This comes somewhat as a shock as many of the artists listed on the top 100 don’t even sing any lyrics at all. Yet they are quick to eliminate her from the list simply because they view her as nothing more than a tool? If you wish to contact them about the matter to help revise their decision, you can contact them by using this contact form.

Even though it’s likely that the voting isn’t used for official purposes, the response from the admins was rather self contradictory. The list cannot truly represent the interests of the internet community if the site admins are free to remove any entry at will.

Just 30 minutes ago, it was announced on Hatsune Miku’s Facebook page that an official youtube channel had opened up. In less than 20 minutes, the channel had already reached an impressive 1,000 subs. It is currently unknown what the channel will be used for, but you will find a few older concert videos listed.

Since Crypton is in charge of the channel, it will probably have unique and exclusive video releases and previews. So go ahead and give it a sub and stay tuned for what’s to come. You can find the channel here.

Feel free to watch below or watch it here, and share it with your friends! This is something all fans must see, and will be a moment in Vocaloid history to remember.

UPDATE: And a teaser video for the new song was posted by livetune himself. Thanks to Vocaloidism for the find!

Toyota could benefit by taking some notes from google. =P

Now that we have that out of the way, enjoy this wonderful music piece from Kenichi Chiba. This track was created as a prayer song to the people of Japan after the quake and tsunami disaster earlier this year. You can also get the song for free from his piapro account, located here.

The figurine includes a stand, a microphone, ice cream, a baseball, and even a papercraft box as part of the set. Feel free to read more about it, and check out images from goodsmile above. If you’re interested in buying one, you can place your pre-order over here for 2600 JPY ($34 USD).

Here’s a quick preview of the figurine itself. If you know any other pre-order sources that are inexpensive and ship internationally, please post it in the comments!

We can finally do away with the announcement title of “Hatsune Miku: Project Mirai”. Now it’s called “Hatsune Miku and Future Stars Project Mirai”.

The launch date is supposedly set for March 8th with a launch price of ¥6,090 for the normal release, and ¥7,140 for the limited edition including a Nendoroid Puchi figurine (smaller than a normal Nendoroid) as well as a plastic fan. Image is available here. The higher game cost over the titles on PSP is likely due to the production cost of the game cartridge versus optical media.

Remember that 3DS titles are region locked, and the game can only be played on a Japanese 3DS. So if you plan on playing the game, you’ll have to have an imported 3DS as well.

Details on the game itself is still sketchy, so we’ll need to wait for the official announcement from Sega later this week. Here’s the game trailer once again that was revealed after the Nintendo press conference in September. Info found via andrasang.com.

Trivia: Did you know that Miku and Mirai both mean “Future” in Japanese?

Those of you who are collectors of Miku figurines or fans of the music/illustration work by HanasoumenP (HSP) may want to look into getting this highly cute figurine. The model is based on original artwork by HSP himself. If you’re wondering why the style is familiar, it’s because he is also one of the artists for the anime “My little sister can’t be this cute”. You can find more of his illustrative work here.

The model shows her playing what appears to be a Yamaha(?) electric keyboard, which is plugged into a small green alien-blob looking amp. The only way this could be better is if Miku actually played music. :3

More details as well as pre-order information can be found here at amiami. If anyone else knows sources with good prices that also ship internationally, please let me know in the comments!

 
Miku playing a PSP inside a PSP. PSPception? Image courtesy of salanos.

I’ll quickly go over some changes and features offered in the game, so those of you interested in buying a copy will know what you’re getting. Read the full story for more!

To start, it is probably important to say that the game play is, for the most part, unchanged from PjD 2nd. Don’t fix what isn’t broken right? Although I do think the difficulty was ramped up slightly on Hard difficulty compared to 2nd. Another major plus to note: The save data from 2nd can be imported to Extend. Any modules, room items, characters, and even money that you earned in 2nd will be imported into Extend. How nice is that?

Upon starting the game for the first time, you’re met with a new style start screen. I always love watching the character silhouettes dance around and do perform actions.

These title screens are always nice and colorful.

Those who have played 2nd will find that the menu layout is exactly the same. So navigation should be no trouble for PjD veterans. Those who do have difficulty can use the icons as a reference, or even use the English patch available from the Project Diva Wikispaces.

The menu layout is virtually unchanged in Extend.

The music selection screen deserves the most mention, as quite a few changes have been made to the controls here. To quickly change to a different character/module, you now use the Right shoulder button. PV modes for songs can now be quickly accessed using the triangle button, just like they used to be in the first game. The most handy feature of all though is the ability to automatically set the default characters for any song. Simply highlight a song on the screen, and press START to enable the Default Character mode. This is extremely handy for playing tracks that use two different characters at once. You can also see your scores for songs and difficulties without going back to the game statistics menu.

The song selection menu. Note how track scores are now visible.

A small but notable change has also been made to the result screen at the end of each song. The characters are now animated instead of seeing a static model. You’ll also see a percentage based on your overall score. You can even take a screenshot of your result screen by pressing the right shoulder button!

Scored a perfect on Melody.exe on my second try!

A final feature to mention is the ability to import the DLC from 2nd into Extend! Sega was kind enough to provide an option to make importing the DLC a painless process. If you want to know how, just check this reference on the Project Diva Wikispaces page.

Here you can see I’ve selected Teto after importing the DLC from 2nd.

As a fan, I highly recommend the game. It borrows only a few tracks from the previous games, while the rest are all new. In fact, a lot of them were very popular tracks, many of which you’d be familiar with. It’s almost as if the game was created to be a “greatest hits” collection of sorts. I’m sad that is has 10 less songs than 2nd (36 versus 46), but it was nice of them to make the DLC from 2nd compatible. There is also over 150 modules total across all characters to choose from!

I’m off to go play it a bit more and unlock the rest of the tracks+modules. So expect a few days of silence. =P

As I’m sure you’ve heard before, there will be a live concert in Singapore later tonight, approximately 16 hours from now. Those who cannot attend it in person can conveniently watch the live stream online as it happens! It’s not the same as actually being there, but it’s the next best thing. So those who want to watch it as it happens can head over here to buy your online viewing pass.

Those who can’t watch it tonight can still purchase a ticket and watch it anytime online for the next two weeks after the concert ends.

For those of you in Singapore, and all over the world… Have fun and enjoy the show!