Maybe some of you have heard the name at least one time.
AKB48 is one of Japanese idol group which is really influential for Japanese pop culture.
AKB48 is Japanese idol group that was produced by Yasushi Akimoto.
AKB48 was advertised as "Idol You Can Meet": create a theater based idol group whose fans could see their live daily.
That is really new style concept of idol group, but because of the concept, they make many kinds of problems.
I will pick up three AKB48's common and popular problems in here.
①Fake Popularity
Usually, their CD pertain an event ticket which fans can see them and shook hands.
Some core fans want to shook hands many time, so they buy bunch of CD.
According to the guys, he waist on his money for buying CD. He spend about 2,000,000 yen for this, and he bought at least hundred of CDs for each.
Recently, these kind of "Core Fan" appear to be growing.
I think they can be a reason why AKB48 sell many CD and seems like it became a big hit and topped the Oricon chart.
②Bad Rumors on the Internet
Some of anti-AKB fans spread rumors about AKB48 members: some of them create a movie thing and upload on Youtube or nikoniko-douga.
Generally, most of the rumors are about members' cosmetic surgery performance.
There are many kinds of disgusting things about AKB48.
③Unofficial AKB Products
Some fans create many unofficial AKB products.
One of the famous example is "Oppai(boobs) Mouse Pad"
It can destroy image of AKB48 members, but many AKB fans bought the unofficial products.
You still can buy this on Yahoo auction
The three problems are really common to Japanese idol group, not only AKB48.
Internet supported AKB48 to be popular, but ironically it has helped negatively.
Whether they are good or not, we can not harm them.
Fans should support them in right way.
Unofficial products and rumors do not help AKB at all.
Sadly, we still can see the negative things on Internet.
We should realize how social media and Internet are powerful to influence someone, something, and somewhere.
Interesting post. I don't know if this "idol" thing is unique to Japan but I certainly haven't seen it anywhere else. Even if you go to regular festivals and such it's amazing to see stalls filling their spaces with AKB48 prizes etc (and some of the "prizes" actually look so revealing I always wonder if it's sending the right message to young kids who would definitely go to these events..).
返信削除The video as well was really interesting..and those were some BIG changes o.o When I think about it though I kinda draw connections with even mainstream artists such as Ayumi Hamasaki. She also had a lot of cosmetic surgery done right? But for some reason nobody really gives her a hard time about that. Hmm... Or even Korean artists..
>mome
返信削除I am also not sure that they are Idol or not.
> some of the "prizes" actually look so revealing I always wonder if it's sending the right message to young kids who would definitely go to these events..
I agree with your opinion. Yes, these kind of stupid products are not always good for kids.Some of AKB fans are too young(middle high school students or younger are included).
Ayumi Hamasaki have already gotten a hard time. It was about 10 or more years ago. Kumi Koda is also had a lot of cosmetic surgery done. Both of them already got a hard time same as AKB48.
Hm.. Well then in that case it's interesting how you don't really hear about that anymore. Especially since Koda and Hamasaki are seen as "proper" singers today. Takes ten years huh? :P
返信削除>mome
返信削除Im not sure, it was exactly ten years(I think it around 10 years...).
hmmm, yeah some anti-fans spread the rumors as AKB's anti-fans, and created some videos and photos same as I posted on here.
However, I really do not hear the rumors anymore because these kind of rumors spread out only when they are NEW.
Now, both of them are pretty famous and not NEW anymore right? Then anti-fans are not interested in creating new rumors except both of them get a stupid problem(crimes, drug, suicide etc).
Hm...that might be a negative side-effect of how we're able to quickly spread information today with various Internet services..
返信削除You added pics from the new AKB cafe! I just saw that this past weekend!
返信削除>Mome
返信削除>You added pics from the new AKB cafe! I just saw that this past weekend!
With ME!!!!
This is an interesting blog post. I appreciate the research that went into it and the various points you develop in your analysis.
返信削除I find it curious and interesting that you say that buying unofficial products hurts the reputation of AKB48 members. It seems to me that this is one of the prices of being a celebrity.
>Scott
返信削除thanks for your comment.
> It seems to me that this is one of the prices of being a celebrity
What does it mean? for AKB48's member or people who made an unofficial products?