#youtaite

Well, first off, it's not just YouTaites that use tuning nowadays. It's basically become an industry standard in the mixing world and opting to not use it has become the exception.

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Now, I can't exactly answer the question in detail for every single YouTaite because we're all at different skill levels when it comes to singing. However, I will say that the reason that tuning is supposed to be used is to clean up the vocals and fix the tiny imperfections that happen simply because we're human.

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For better or for worse, a recorded mix is expected to be perfect in all ways and untuned vocals, no matter how good or on pitch they are, won't always live up to that standard.

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Beyond that, it's simply a matter of how much each person relies on the tuning. For example, I tune my vocals, but only after I've given every single line my very best and could stand to listen to them if they were untuned or if I sounded like that in a live performance.

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On the other hand, there are people who rely on tuning because they're not very good at staying on pitch. When I meet people like that, I tell them to focus more on improving their singing because I have a knack for tuning and I know firsthand that tuning does not fix everything in terms of mistakes or pitch problems.

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Sadly, a lot of anime and Vocaloid songs are more or less unsingable in terms of getting them completely perfect without any mistakes because of how difficult they are, so the tuning has almost become a necessity and, well, if you really listen closely, you'll hear even the Utaites and professional singers using it.

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In my opinion, I think it's just that YouTaites are the easiest target because there's so many of us and because so many of us use tuning, albeit to different lengths and for different reasons.

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When I was just startin out, I used to just rip the audio from those off-vocal karaoke vids using Youtube-mp3 or something hahhaha but yeah that ruins the quality a bit.

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I usually:
a) Go to the original NND upload & look for it in the description (you'll see it as "カラオケ", "オケ", or something similar)
b) Find the karaoke link at the bottom of the Vocaloid wiki page of the song
c) Find the karaoke link in the description of an off-vocal karaoke vid on Youtube
d) Hunt down the producer's Piapro & look for the off-vocal there (title usually in Japanese)

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And well, if all else fails, I'd either
-Look for an arrangement of the song (piano, guitar, music box, band, etc.)
-Just do the ol' "rip-audio-from-Youtube" method (not recommended unless the video's audio is high quality)
-Try to make it myself...?????? Or maybe ask ((pay)) someone else to re-make it, or find someone who already did

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There are also some songs whose off-vocals are only released in an album (which you have to pay for first), so I don't usually go for those songs...and even if you did somehow have access to them, your cover might just end up being blocked on Youtube or worse, taken down due to copyright (some Youtaite had issues with these; Mafumafu songs in particular). So yeah, just be careful with your song choice; go for the ones whose off-vocals are freely provided (which means you don't have to ask for the producer's permission anymore), or use arrangements.
Whatever you end up using though, DO credit the original producer of the song.

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Here's a pic of methods A-D, if it'd help :)
Happy singing ahahha <3

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Oh please no, don't apologize! I'm happy to talk about Phil whenever and wherever ;^))
Jk jk. But seriously, it's really fine. Long distance relationships are hard, but honestly, I think any serious relationships would be hard... We do have fights. Pretty often. We both have our fair share of self-esteem, trust, etc related issues that sometimes make it really hard for us to understand each other. Other times, just due to the sheer amount of time we spend talking, misunderstandings happen. There's never going to be a relationship that doesn't require some amount of work from both sides, and that includes a willingness to talk when something difficult to handle comes up...

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For us, we get through the fights by being as patient as possible. I personally try to remind myself forcefully that I probably don't have the whole story, that maybe I'm misunderstanding something, and that if we talk about it, we can probably come to some kind of agreement. Or sometimes, one or the other just needs some space to calm down and think (usually me. Phil doesn't like being alone much). But all this hinges on a kind of dedication, where you know it's probably going to hurt, or be hard, but your relationship is worth the work.

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I actually really lucked out in this matter. The very first thing I noticed about Phil when we started talking, just as friends, was how honest and open he was, how expressive he was about how he felt and what he wanted. This is still one of my favourite things about him. I've dated other guys before, most of them not long-distance, and none of them were ever as open with me as he is. Maybe it was a lack of willingness to put in the effort. Maybe it was some kind of macho drive to appear manly or stronk like bull. Idek. I had one long term relationship end, and AFTER it ended, my ex told me that he didn't feel like I was affectionate enough or loved him. I could have done something, put in more effort, had I known that he felt that way... But that's all in the past. I can trust Phil to always let me know if something's bothering him, always at least try and talk and resolve any potential issues before they build up and blow up, and I'm not entirely sure he quite understands how much I appreciate this about him 8'DD

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*ahem* Wow I talk a lot... TL;DR, yes, it's normal, you handle it by being willing to talk and compromise like the friends you are, and yes, we've come out of it pretty well so far, and I think we will continue to do so ;w;/

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I think it's alright as long as you're not being too creepy and you respect their responses. Excuse you though, I wouldn't say MOST youtaites are snobby. ._.

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How would you feel if you were approached by a complete stranger on the street saying they were crazy about your clothes? Crazy about your phone or just anything associated with yourself? You'd say thank you and then what would you talk about?

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See.

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It's not easy to approach or converse with just anyone with such little information given and people will most likely not be as open to you and you have to respect that. If you have something in common with them, then maybe you would have and nice long conversation about shoes or whatever it is, but you have to at least respect that they've set their own limits as to what they can share with strangers like yourself.

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I don't think anything is inherently wrong with trying to be friends with someone you admire or are a fan of, but there is definitely a right and a wrong way to go about it. A lot of people, I've found, make the mistake of coming on WAAAY too strong in an attempt to be friends and, to me, it comes off as pushy, potentially creepy, or even very invasive to demanding of my attention or personal details.

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I'm often asked "Can we be friends?" or "Do you want to be friends with me?" And this is the worst kind of way to try and spark a friendship, because when someone asks to this someone else, it puts the other person in a potentially awkward position because:
1. They probably don't want to say yes because they don't know you
2. They're hesitant to say no because they don't want to hurt your feelings but again, they probably have no idea who you are

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I don't think most youtaites are snobby, in fact, a lot of them are super sweet and friendly! I love talking to many of them and consider many my friends!! But you have to understand that some might be quite guarded because of experiences with random people in the past, or might simply be how they are in general. Some people might only like having a few close friends, while others like to be friends with everyone!

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Friendship forms and happens with time, and if it's meant to be then it'll happen! Maybe you'll click right away, maybe it'll take time, or maybe you'll find that your personalities don't quite match up, but that doesn't make either of you bad people! It's just how it goes!! 8') Idk, we're all just people trying to live our lives, and we will all respond to things and people in different ways! It doesn't always work out but so life goes on then...

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Just be respectful, and respect the space of others ; v ; <3

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When I first joined the community, I looked up to a lot of people, and I ended up being good friends with them as time passed on, so there's definitely nothing creepy about it! While I don't think there's anything wrong with fans being friends with people in the youtaite community, I feel like you need to approach this as any social situation.

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Online friendships are built upon the same foundation as offline ones. That means that the expectations should be the same as if you were in a school trying to get to know people. Constantly barraging people with questions, or asking/hoping for attention rarely leads to a meaningful friendship, can not only end up with you seeming creepy or annoying, but can also make the people you're trying to befriend seem like snobs to you. :c

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Don't forget that youtaites are still people on the other side of the screen. We're not magical unicorns or anything. Just average people who sing Japanese online karaoke. ;]

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Not really creepy but when someone you don't know asks you out of nowhere "can we be friends?" or something like that. It makes it very awkward to reply to because that's not really how most friendships happen. They just do haha, I've befriended a lot of people I admire in the community by just simply letting it happen over straight out asking for friendship.

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But honestly, most friendships in this community happen due to a mutual interest in something they do (sing/art/mix/animation/etc) (there's nothing wrong with this) and the "click factor" between their taste and personalities. When you're just a fan that's not very active it's kind of harder to attract interest if you know what I mean. (This sounds a bit harsh but that's how I see it ; ;)

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Another point that might make you think they seem snobby (which don't get me wrong there will always be condescending people anywhere) is that friendships tend to feel overwhelming. Keeping up with friends is not very easy specially in a large community like this (I suck at keeping up with friendships) so people tend to just stick to their cliques and groups where they feel most comfortable. (Nothing wrong with this as well)

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So yeah... sorry for the long paragraph, regardless of what happens in this kind of cases it doesn't take away that most people you're admiring really appreciate your support and don't really mean to be "snobby".

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Holy hell this is going to be long. Bear with me? I mean.

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Make the Youtaite community better 2k16.
Though in all seriousness, when people decide to make some public statement and lay their opinions out there for people to see, and they really open themselves up to being criticized. Furthermore, they went as far as to put down a community in order to elevate their new group, which is what I feel a lot of the people on twitter responded to, along with the irony of their actions. The issue itself is really complex, but I feel that people were NEVER calling people out by name in this exchange.

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HOWEVER, I do agree that some people took things too far with some of the joking statements and turned it into opinions with some malicious intent. THAT SAID, please remember that I personally have issue with the ideal and the whole way it was executed, rather than the people involved behind it. I posted a screenshot with a comment, and the original post was posted in a facebook group with over 1000 users.

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Yes, I made some joking comments because honestly, I've never understood that fierce need lately for people to use the labels to describe themselves in this community. The whole "youtaite" label didn't even exist when I first starting weeb online singing. Honestly speaking, utaite wasn't even a term either! We're just a bunch of people singing asian songs online who happen to be uploading it on YT for the most part.

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There's a lot more to say about this but honestly, it's not really worth delving into as an ask answer. If you want to talk to me about it, you're more than welcome to DM me directly about it. I have no issues with talking about this, and my DMs are open.
(o u o)b

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And no, I don't regret posting what I did on twitter. I'm behind everything I've said.

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There could be a few reasons behind this

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-They've been harassed by a lot of random people on twitter that they no longer trust random people mentioning them
-They don't feel comfortable responding to random strangers

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Lots of youtaite are in cliques and only feel comfortable talking to those inside them, which is why many of them will not respond to everyone who tweets at them. I've seen a lot of my nicest friends who try to respond to everyone get offensive and invasive questions sent to their twitter as well as be harassed, so I don't honestly find it elitist as more as it is just a matter of being comfortable! Many youtaite use twitter as more of a chat room unlike others who just use it to update on their projects and what not.

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So I would not say a lot of youtaite are elitist, but I can't deny that there are some who genuinely think they are better than everyone else and refuse to talk to someone who has less than like 500 followers on twitter, and it's really sad to see.......there's so many awesome people you're missing out on when you just ignore everyone and all the possible collaborations and even friendships you could make.

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BUT HEY that's just the way I am, some people feel better remaining within a very small group of friends and as a result will not talk to anyone other than them!

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Ah well welcome to the maso world of a YouTaite :D!
Hm... Well, views/attention/notice is usually off luck! If you consider me to have those, then I myself am not too sure ><
But, I do believe that 'spamming' your recent cover to certain Google+/Facebook groups could help (as long as appropriate, and within reason), as well as getting a Twitter and following lots of people, and sharing it there too! You wouldn't believe how amazing Twitter is haha
That said, value quality over quantity! If you need to take more time to produce better, more awesome covers, then take the time and release quality stuff!!
Don't be afraid to ask questions for mixing, animating, or whatever else!
As long as you have a kind personality, and are outgoing to some extent, you'll grow in due time :) It doesn't happen over night, but remember to do this because you enjoy and love it!!
Have fun :D

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There's one thing you have to realize:

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When you really desire something, you're going to face opposition, and sometimes that opposition may come from the people you least want it to come from (i.e your parents)

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Regardless of what they think, spending money on a mic to sing is not "wasting money" to you no matter what they or anyone else may think.

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It's something that genuinely is important to you, and that makes it an extremely valuable treasure. Singing is so freeing and fun and glorious to do, I can't understand anyone who says that it's a waste of time and money, because it's how we all express ourselves.

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Stay strong and go forth to becoming a youtaite, and have fun doing it, and always know that it's because you want to do it that makes it all worthwhile, never a waste of money or time

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Happy Youtaite-ing! <3

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You improve by first not being afraid to suck. You're going to suck and it's going to suck for a while too, but what sets apart the good youtaite from the mediocre ones is the amount of dedication it takes to become better. I couldn't sing more than 3 notes without cracking for like ages when I first started (back in 2010) and I just kept on screeching through many days and nights of frustration in my closet until I looked up Youtube tutorials on how to sing and that really helped push me forward on a path to healthier and vocal longevity. I highly recommend Eric Arceneux's vocal tutorials and warmups as I still use them today and still keep improving with them.

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You say you love singing; Do you love it enough to the point that you're willing to deal with the pain and frustration it takes to get better at it? If your answer is yes, then welcome~you're going to be awesome one day

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Also, NEVER NEEEEEEEEEEEVER compare your level of development to other people. I have done this countless times myself, especially considering how fast my younger brother has achieved so much success at his young age of 14 while I'm 21 and taking a risk to see if maybe youtube will work out for me. You're going to move at your own pace, and the moment you stop looking at how far other people come and focus more on your own gradual improvements, the more your own beautiful voice will start to come out and shine and make its mark on the youtaite world.

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It's really cliche to say, but honestly never give up. I did not get to the level I'm at by just stopping one day and saying "nah". I honestly spent days doing weird lip trills and vocal excersizes, failing at them day by day, wanting to quit and getting close to quitting, sometimes losing my voice and becoming afraid that i'd never sing again, and then slowly by slowly starting to get the hang of them, discovering my higher range and how much fun I had with it, failing at those higher notes and thinking of myself as worthless and a horrible singer, and then just picking myself up and going ahead and recording and uploading.

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It really does take courage to upload what you do onto the internet, and even more to be able to face what others have to say about it. I can't tell you how many times I've wanted to just disappear from the comments I've seen not only on YT, but especially on NicoNIco (as a foreigner it's so much worse when you upload your singing and people comment thinking you don't understand them)

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Sorry for this long answer, but I feel really strongly on how important it is to have faith in yourself, and really work hard to become better each day. Take it day by day, and always remember to keep the vision of the singer you want to become in your heart, and hold it close to you. No one can take away your ability to become great except you.

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Happy singing <3

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Well, if you're asking how to get popularity, I don't think frequent uploads are the only important thing, but then again I couldn't care less for being well known, as to me, singing is a passion and I'm just happy sharing my work with public. :< I'd say quality is always more important than quantity, you can upload few covers a year and still get popular if your uploads are really high quality both singing and mixing wise. It's also important to get to know people in the community (for example by spending lots of time on twitter and talking to people there so that they know who you are), keep improving your singing and mixing skills (or if you find people who will agree to mix for you, then you can focus on the singing alone, but I like being independent and not having to wait for people to mix or animate for me, that's why I learned how to do both of those :D) and what else, hmmm... I would say that anime covers are more popular than Vocaloid ones, but then again, with anime songs you need to know which songs are highly copyrighted and can get taken down. I usually cover anime songs using fanmade instrumentals or piano/acoustic instrumental covers to make sure my work won't get me in trouble. For Vocaloid songs, if you cover super old songs like Magnet or Kokoro, there's a little chance people will find it as there's way too many of those. I'd definitely go for the newer popular ones if you really care about people noticing you. Singing in English also draws more fans to you as the youtaite community is an English-speaking one, but the most important thing is to actually have an interesting voice and be good at singing. :D If I was a newbie in this community I would definitely spend lots of time working on the quality of my covers, I would probably join like every possible chorus battle (check those out, they can help you with people noticing you too!) because they teach you SO much about both the community and skills that are useful in it and idk... I would definitely make friends and have fun with them, I guess that's what this community should be about - having fun and making friends with similar interests to ours :) Anyway, good luck making covers and I hope you'll have lots of fun with them ♥

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