From Participatory Culture to Precarious "Playbour": A Study on the Structural Differences of Digital Participation in the Hatsune Miku Platform

Abstract

Against the backdrop of the continuous integration of the platform economy and the digital entertainment industry, virtual idols have emerged as a crucial media form connecting cultural participation, digital labor, and capital operation. Drawing on theoretical frameworks such as participatory culture, playbour, and platform capitalism, this paper takes Hatsune Miku as a case study to analyze how its platform structure, intellectual property arrangements, and commercialization mechanisms organize the digital participation practices of fans and creators. The research finds that through layered governance and peer production mechanisms, Hatsune Miku has buffered the common risk of labor precarity in platformized production to a certain extent, preventing cultural participation from being fully transformed into exploited digital labor. This paper thus argues that the structural differences in institutional design among different virtual idol platforms are key factors shaping participation forms and labor relations.