The Happy Idol Family

Imagine a world where all Idols co-exist in peace. Where AKB and H!P fans are united by a common love of Japanese Idols and the billion-dollar industry that they live and work in.

It's a peculiar idea, but it's one that seems to come in waves. I'm not even one hundred percent sure why this idea persists so much, perhaps just out of naiveté and wishful thinking.

But perhaps even more naive and wishful is the idea that the industry already works like this. And this idea is even more perplexing. It would be all too easy to say that this is purely a thought of the new fan, the DD who thinks that liking one member or group in Hello! Project also means you should be a fan of all of H!P. That's a state of thinking I'm sure we've all been in at some point - I know, at least, that my own attitude to H!P was a lot more across-the-board and DD, as it's known, when I first became a fan than it is today.

Perhaps that was also just a product of the times, though. Back then, YouTube was a much smaller and more niche place, with video quality that today makes me want to gouge my own eyes out. At the same time, anime and Japanese pop culture was in the middle of a massive explosion in the US and other western countries. I don't think it's any coincidence that the boom in western interest in anime of the mid-2000s coincided with the birth and similarly explosive influence of YouTube - a video sharing website which made it incredibly easy to upload, share, and find new content.

So at the time, people hungrily consumed any anime they could get their hands on more than ever before. And so when, as many of us did, people made the jump from being a fan of Japanese Anime to Japanese Idols, it brought with it that mentality of trying everything.

Of course everyone had their taste and preferences in anime. So people liked Naruto while others preferred Outlaw Star, or whatever. But most people still defined themselves as a fan of anime as an entire medium or industry, than a single show or studio. So when this group began to overlap and spawn new fans of the many Idol groups that came and vanished during the past decade then the creation of an "Idol Fan" subculture was perhaps inevitable. You liked Morning Musume and Arashi, but not C-ute? That was just your taste, you were still a fan of Idols. No-one told you it should be any different!

But, of course, whether you became an "anime fan" in the 90s or early 2000s when you took whatever you could get your hands on, or during the boom in the mid-2000s where we overstuffed on the sheer unprecedented volume of content made possible by sites like YouTube or Crunchyroll, that western anime-loving sub-culture has now matured enough that the idea of a generic anime fan is rapidly disappearing. It has diversified, and just because you watched Bleach doesn't mean you're also going to have watched Higashi no Eden. In fact, it's now more likely than ever that you haven't.

So, it seems to me that if the anime fandom has diversified this much, then it stands to reason that the western Idol fandom must also be doing the same. And now, despite anything I may have written on this blog or elsewhere in the past, I don't really feel there is any such thing as an "Idol fan".

But somewhere along the line, when a certain AKB48 was gaining in popularity, a vast number of these "Idol fans" began to support the new unit. In itself there's nothing wrong with that - it's possible to like more than a single band. But this was happening in ever larger numbers, as people started to notice their friends talking about AKB48 and followed them to see what the fuss was about. This of course created a sort of schism, with the hardcore fans of either group throwing nothing but contempt and abuse at the other camp, and many of those DD "I like Idols" fans caught in the middle. In retaliation to the increasing conflict, those trapped fans began to fall on the idea that being an Idol fan is universal and you can (and perhaps should) love all Idols.

Within the last year or two, though, I've noticed this trend continuing, and a return, even from some fairly long-time fans, to the notion that the Idol industry is all one big happy family. An idea which has been largely encouraged by the agencies themselves as AKB and H!P seem eager to showing anything but hostility towards the other party.

We've seen them appearing on shows together, doing collaborative performances with each other, and ultimately seen the members themselves professing their wotadom for the other group. So it's no wonder then that the fans are starting to believe that the two agencies are actually mutually understanding and co-operative.

But, perhaps or perhaps not a good idea, it's one which is based on a lie.

The truth is that, while Japanese fans of AKB and H!P are on the whole a lot less hostile towards one another than their western counterparts, there's very little love lost between the two either.

Of course, the agencies want to distance themselves from that hostility, simply because it's in both of their interests. There's little actual respect involved there beyond what allows them to remain competitive. UFA of course doesn't want you buying AKB merch instead of their own, they are in direct competition. But if you make the AKB fans think you are accepting of it, then they're also going to have a higher opinion of your own company and buy your products too. That's the idea anyway, and AKB is playing the exact same game for the exact same reasons.

There actually is no "happy family" when it comes to the Idol industry save perhaps for the relationship between artists in the same group or agency. It's much easier to foster a relationship between Berryz and C-ute when the only competition is internal and therefore does no real damage to Hello!Project or UFA as a whole. It's much harder to realistically be genuinely close friends when you are Morning Musume and AKB48 and competing to win the support, and ultimately limited pocket money, of the exact same demographic.

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Wota-kai!? Episode 8

We're back after having to postpone the show for a couple weeks.

Our guest, Oroboras, has a somewhat busy work schedule, so the only day we could feasibly record on was a Thursday. And when a thunderstorm caused Ren to lose all internet access a couple hours before we were about to record, it was decided that we'd have to postpone.

This is episode 8, and the second episode featuring Ren as host.

Oroboras, a regular on Konya mo TKMR, happily agreed to appear on the show, and is the second TKMR member to do so. My top-secret plan is to get enough of them on the show that the two become some form of affiliated shows! Okay, not really. But it'd be interesting.

At any rate, I've known him for a few years and is probably one of the H!P fans I'm closest to. We both have a quite similar sense of humour so I've always gotten on well with him. And so I was pretty pleased when he agreed to come on the show.

The guest topics this time include how PVs have improved or not over the last few years, as well as how fans become over-sensitive to certain topics regarding their Idols.

You can download the episode from here, or alternatively, listen to the streamable MixCloud version below.

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Wota-kai!? Episode 7

Last night we released the 7th episode of Wota-kai!?

It comes as we pass the middle of the first season, and Sazaki Ren takes up the reins as host for the coming few episodes, while I myself am relegated to co-host for the duration - though my work behind the scenes hasn't lessened by very much.

This episode proved to be the most difficult yet, that much is certain. The internet troubles and poor Skype quality that have so plagued us in previous episodes reached a new low this episode, and there were several times when at least one of us simply couldn't hear what the others were saying as the audio stream cut out. We made do and pieced sentences together with whatever words were picked up, or we waited until the call stabilised a bit and then resumed, with the role of actually playing host to the call jumping back and forth several times as someone disconnected.

Of course, thanks to the way in which the show is actually recorded, none of those Skype issues actually affect the quality of the show we release to you, as the audio quality is limited only by the grade of the microphone and audio set up each host and guest uses. But it does certainly make the recording process a bit of a nightmare sometimes.

Then, halfway through discussing the guest topics, our guest suffered a minor incident where his headset was accidentally torn from the USB cable that allows it to work, effectively rendering the headset useless. It was a dilemna. He didn't have a spare and wouldn't be able to replace it for a few days. We were faced with the option of cancelling the show for the week and attempting again the following, or continuing on for the last 20 minutes without our guest. In the end, that's what we decided on doing.

Then the third nail in the coffin was that upon receiving all the raw data to begin editing with, I noticed that a few sections in the recording were either in the wrong order, or overlapped. I managed to correct the order easily enough, but parts where the audio had overlapped were completely unusable, so I cleaned those up as best I could and re-recorded any parts that were unusable but essential.

It was definitely one trail after another, but we pulled through and managed to get the show finished. And there are a few things I learnt from it, and will hopefully better prepare for in the future.

So who was this guest who brought unbalance to the show? None other than Nao-kun, of course!

I had started looking around for potential guests to come on the show, as offers had begun to dry up, and my mind instantly went to the group of regulars in the Maasa thread, and Nao-kun happened to be the first person I asked.

Aside from perhaps myself and Gin, I believe he's one of the longest serving users still active in that thread - as much as the Maasa thread can ever hope to be described as "active", at any rate. Though technically a Momoko fan, he's also one of four people I recruited to help with the Church of Maasa - a blog with levels of activity that fluctuate even worse than the Maasa thread itself. 

The guest topics for this week, for as much as we actually got to discuss them, were on H!P overseas events and how they compare to Japanese ones, and on the various English-speaking fan communities around the internet.

The episode can be downloaded from the tracker here, alternatively, the MixCloud version is now available below.

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Wota-kai!? Episode 6

Earlier today we released the sixth episode of Wota-kai!?, the Hello! Project news and discussion podcast hosted by myself and Sazaki Ren.

This week the special guest was alita87.

It's actually the first time talking to a user whom I didn't know prior to the recording, which, as I pointed out last week, was probably the challenge I was most looking forward to having a crack at with this show.

All the previous guests I've either spoken to often enough,  as with Liamers who I have known and been good friends with since 2007, and guests like sanrio, who I hadn't actually spoken to all that much, but was still somewhat used to seeing him around the same chatrooms and on STD.

Alita, however, is a guest I had only ever really seen in the chat during the Konya mo TKMR livestream.

I feel the show actually went fairly well on my part. I'm not entirely sure why, whether it was his internet behaving badly or simple over-tiredness but Ren ended up being much more silent than I've ever heard him.

Thankfully, there were no major issues with the show, though, as we had last week. Originally Alita was scheduled to appear on episode 7, and episode 6 would feature another guest entirely. So we were originally expecting to have a report from Berryz Koubou at AnimeNEXT from that guest who attended the event, but when I contacted him to confirm his appearance this week, he informed me that he would be unable to make the recording. Thankfully, we were informed early enough that we were able to move Alita forward two weeks to replace him without any issue, however.

I do hope that guest renews his interest in appearing in the future, but for now I'm assuming that he will be indefinitely unable to do it.

The episode can be downloaded from here, or alternatively streamed using the widget below.

If you have any feedback or suggestions for the show, or would like to appear as a special guest and voice your own H!P opinions, then please contact me on H!O or on Twitter @The_Dran.

One suggestion I've had multiple times, and am looking in to, is to providing an alternate mirror for the download. Torrents of course die, and some users simply can't use them due to conflicts with their ISP or simple lack of knowledge about how torrents work. I've been looking in to a few locations, but I do plan to at some point provide either DDL links for each episode, or some other method of streaming the show. In order to ensure that the torrent does get a decent number of hits - enough that it doesn't die immediately - any official DDL or streamable alternative will probably be released a couple days later than the torrent, however. With that in mind, though, if you have any ideas for good podcast hosting services, then by all means let me know.

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Wota-kai!? Episode 5

Wota-kai!? is back for its fifth episode.

Making this episode turned out to be more complicated than any other episode we've done thus far, as on the initial recording day we were plagued by technical problems and Skype was simply not stable enough for recording a podcast to be viable.

Much of these problems persisted throughout the week and, though we managed to successfully record the following day, even that wasn't without its problems as mid-way through the show, Ren's internet suddenly imploded and we were left unsure as to whether he would return or if we'd have to simply finish the show without him for the better part of half an hour.

Anyway, without going into any more detail than I already have, for the rest of the week, many of these same technical issues, compounded with real life and schedule issues, interfered with the editing process and forced release back by almost a week longer than our usual release date.

Enough about that, however.

The special guest this week was none other than Sanrio, who used to host his own podcast, STD, which provided most of the original inspiration for this one (and previous ones I did a few years ago).

Sanrio is someone I've also known for some time, though never really spoken to him at any real length before this podcast - so aside from the strangeness of talking to someone I've spoken to a lot, but never with audio, such as it was for episode two featuring magatsu17, this one was an even bigger challenge in that I had to communicate with someone who I haven't actually spoken to all that much even on IRC or Twitter.

I look forward to the challenge of recording a show with someone I have actually never spoken to before.

Sanrio also set the bar pretty high, I feel, in terms of what a host should be like. There were definitely times, and we both agree, where it felt like he was the host rather than I. But this is to be expected when the guest served as host on his own podcast for several years and the actual host is a newbie just starting out - as I am.

Still, it really drew my attention to how much I need to improve to rival Sanrio, and drives me to surpass him, if you'll excuse the horribly clichéd thought.

This week also saw a fairly significant change in the format - as Ren and I both felt that what we had was a little too long, and that there was one glaring aspect of the format which wasn't working - the poorly named "This week I've been watching..." segment.

I'll admit, I'm not sad to see it go. In theory it was a fairly sound idea, but over the last few episodes we've realised that, in fact, the segment is little more than dead-weight as the discussion is only ever really interesting if everyone else has watched the same thing - recently or otherwise - which, it became clear, was expecting an awful lot from each other and our guests. And so, more often than not, the discussion would be fairly one-sided as one person talks about that DVD and repeat much of the same things that had been said about the previous DVD the episode before.

So, we unceremoniously cut it from the show, and the whole thing suddenly feels much stronger and coherent than it ever did.

At any rate, if you have any other feedback or suggestions for the show, or would like to be one of our special guests, do get in contact with me somehow, whether that's on H!O or on Twitter, or whatever you prefer, because correspondence and offers are always welcome.

You can download the podcast here, or listen in below.

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Wota-kai!? Episode 4

It has been 9 weeks since we released the pilot episode. Now we're releasing the 4th.

With each passing episode I feel more and more at ease with this show. I don't think anything will ever help me get over my hatred towards the sound of my own voice, and indeed, the editing process, which often lasts several times the length of the podcast itself, is something of an exercise in trying to not delete all of my own dialogue that makes me cringe.

This episode was no different. Over two and a half hours of audio was recorded, and both trying to clean up the audio and cut it down so it more closely resembles the imaginary 90-minute run-time I have in my head meant that I was still editing this 12 hours after I had started.

But despite the sheer amount of work, which will probably give me nightmares for the next two weeks until it's ready for episode 5, I feel that it's probably my favourite episode so far.

Our guest this week was Murr, currently serving as a translator for fansubbing group TPF, and was formerly one of the core contributors to International Wota. I think I've known her since I joined IntlWota's IRC channel, #wotachat, back in 08. And I'd probably be lying if I said she didn't scare me. Of course, most of the regulars in there scared me over the years - it's fascinating how Idol fandom seems to attract the most insane people.

In the chat, she's always quick (in IRC terms, anyway) to knock me down with a tsukkomi, and I probably imagine her as the most tsundere person in there. But actually talking to her proved to be really enjoyable, and my image of her has probably changed more in the four hours we spoke before and during the podcast than the rest of the four years I've been an wotachatter.

In any case, the guest topics this week were on fansubbing, and the difficulties of translation and how different approaches between different groups can cause problems, and finally on what it is like to live and work in Japan, the centre of fandom for most of us, as Murr does.

You can download the podcast here, or listen to it below.

If you have any comments or feedback, be sure to drop me a line. Also, if you'd like to appear on the show as a guest to voice your own opinions, get in contact with me, as I'm sure we'd be happy to arrange it.

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Wota-kai!? Episode 3

So the show returns for its third episode. The support from you guys, however vocal or silent, has been a huge boon to us, and I thank you.

In some ways, Aika's graduation was something of a godsend. Definitely a shocking turn of events, and tragic for her fans, and of course the dejected Gaki fans who feel that they have had something stolen from them, but with regards to this podcast, it couldn't have come at a better time. 

Last week was effectively the dictionary definition of a "slow news week", and so, right up until the day before we were due to start recording, I honestly had no idea how we were going to fill out the news corner. In the end a combination of Berryz' USB concert and the Aika graduation allowed us a pretty lengthy discussion.

This week we were also joined, as last time, by a special guest. The person we did have penciled in to appear this week had to drop out at almost the last minute, and will hopefully be back for episode 4, but that left us scrambling to find a replacement. 

Luckily, Liamers, a Risa fan I have known for nearly 5 years, had been asking to appear on this show. His schedule meant that he would have to appear on it this week, or he'd have to wait indefinitely for his own schedule to free up a little. But we had already promised the show to the afforementioned guest, so we made arrangements to have Liam back at his earliest convenience. 

This meant that when this week's slot opened up, he was available and ready to make an earlier appearance and the show went forward without a hitch.

In terms of format changes, there's not much. In the interests of time, however, we decided to tweak the way the Guest Topic corner works. Where before the guest and each host would bring an individual topic to discuss, we decided to merge the hosts' topics together. This means that the guest will have a topic to discuss, and Ren and I will have another.

On that note, this week's topics were on Hello!Project and their inability to get roles in mainstream dramas, and on fanworks such as vocal and dance covers, and whether there is any entertainment value in them for anyone other than the creator.

Episode three of Wota-kai!? can be downloaded from Hello! Online tracker here. Alternatively, you can stream it via the widget below.

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Wota-kai!? Episode 2

The show has returned after the pilot proved more successful than we could have ever imagined!

Some scheduling issues got in the way last week. We had hoped to record and have it released by Monday last week, but Ren proved to be too busy on the recording day,  and following attempts to postpone the recording by a day or two proved to be unworkable. So we had to cede defeat and resume as normal the following weekend.

We are now starting to get the hang of it though, and we hope to gradually change the format and the way things work over the next few episodes to make this into the show we had in our minds when we created it.

The biggest such change right now is the introduction of a third member to the podcast. This member is our special guest, and will change every week, as new people are invited, or ask to be on the show. This is something I wanted to do from the very beginning, to help keep the show fresh with new opinions and personality. Especailly as both Ren and myself are Berryz fans above all else, so a Morning Musume fan or a S/mileage one would do well to balance out an episode. Though Ren and I both agreed that the first episode should just be the two of us, so we could find our feet first.

This time, our guest is magatsu17. I've known him since the days when I was in ICU-Subs. He joined quite late in the group's life, and none of the several projects he had timed for them ever actually saw the light of day. So, when we formed KIDS, he seemed like a good person to have do some temp work for us. So disillusioned were we all by ICU, that he was just happy to finally see a project he had worked so hard on actually released.

Episode 2 of the podcast can be found here. Alternatively, you can now listen to it below.

This week's topics include concerts of the past, and how they differ from the concerts of more recent years; whether UP FRONT are always up front about the reasons that members graduate; and whether or not Idols are negatively influenced by the media-percieved sexualization they are subjected to as young girls.

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Wota-kai!? Episode 1

This is something that we have both been thinking of doing for quite some time. But a recent conversation with Sazaki Ren proved to be the catalyst for turning it into reality.

For whatever reason, the conversation turned to a few ideas I had floating around in my head, including a few upgrades to this blog. And I told him about my idea for a regular H!P podcast. The reply was almost instantaneous. "Lets do it." What? That was fast. "I've been wanting to do something like this for a while myself."

And so an idea which I had been rolling around in my head for weeks, but lacked the drive to actually start, suddenly started. We decided on the format, the name, the recording date. And then suddenly it was Sunday, 1st of April, and I was sitting in front of a microphone recording this podcast.

Nerves definitely kicked in, and there was at least one false start. I think you can tell when listening to it that I really don't feel as comfortable at the start as I did later on in the show, but for our pilot episode, I can tell you that we both feel pretty proud of this.

You can download the podcast, which features Hello! Project music and discourse, as well as a news segment and discussion about topics which are relevant to modern H!P fandom, here. Alternatively, you can listen to it by using the widget below.

Of course, any and all feedback, suggestions and constructive criticism is welcome, and should be directed at my Twitter account, or, if you prefer, the comments section or a PM on H!O.

I should also point out that we are looking for guests to appear on the show, so if you would like to add your voice to the discussion, please also contact me via the above methods.

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A New Captainist Era of Hello! Project?

It was announced a while ago that Niigaki Risa would be graduating from Hello! Project. Naturally this announcement was met by all the usual reactions from her fans. Though, and don't hold me too accountable for this, as I didn't give it too much attention, I don't think anyone found the news as shocking as other recent graduations.

In fact, the shocking part was that it took so long for her to graduate.

She is currently the longest-serving member in Morning Musume history, having shared that title with fellow 5th Gen member Takahashi Ai up until Ai's graduation last year.

The gokkies have always been close. Especially Ai-chan and Gaki. During the last few years, the fact that they had become the two oldest, longest-serving members together gave them both a personality that was hard to ignore. The most prominent personalities in Morning Musume since Koharu left.

So the real shock came when Ai-chan announced her own graduation and Gaki didn't follow suit. Most of us had been betting on the fact that the two would graduate together. I feel that most of use wanted that to happen. The idea of the two joining together and graduating together just seemed so right. But it didn't happen.

Gaki has revealed that she had considered it herself, however. But felt that, with two generations of new members just joining, she would be better waiting and then graduating once those new girls had gotten their feet.

But Gaki's graduation suddenly brings about an interesting new dilemna. The succession, if you will.

First off, who will be the new leader of Morning Musume? 

That's Michishige Sayumi. Which is an unusual thought, to be sure. She has built her idol career on a very particular kind of character. A character which made her popular as a member, but one which doesn't fit the "leader" image at all. So it's all too easy to imagine her not being ready to be leader.

I'm sure she'll make a good leader, though. Will she maintain her character through it? It's hard to know. But when Ai-chan became leader, I doubt anyone really thought she was ready for the responsibility either. Perhaps due to the fact that the Miki scandal changed her status in the group from being a regular member, to sub-leader and then on to being leader in only the space of a couple weeks. There are political coups less dramatic than that.

But she took to it well. And I've a feeling that Sayu will do so too.

But the thing that is a whole lot less certain is that unofficial title of "Queen of H!P". One invented by the fans, it is true, but one which UFA gave credence to during the Elder Club graduation when Nakazawa Yuko symbolically handed over the H!P leadership to Takahashi Ai.

That title has previously been based on rank of seniority, however.

According to Tanaka Reina's own interpretation, however, the Hello!Project Kids outrank 6th Gen Morning Musume in seniority. The Musume are older, but the former Kids were added to H!P several months before the rokkies.

Until now, that interpretation has only represented an interesting little quirk of Reina's personality, and her attitude towards her "senpai" in Berryz and C-ute.

But now it's reason enough that Shimizu Saki could become the leader of Hello! Project. She may be younger than several of the members of Momusu (and, indeed, Mano Erina), but as the oldest and most senior of the H!P Kids, that makes her primed to be the new leader.

And if that does happen, that make it the first time since the Elder Club graduation that the leadership of Morning Musume and Hello!Project will be seperate. And the first time ever that a non-Morning Musume member has held the title.

And then what does that mean for the issue of the "flagship" group. In the past it has always been Morning Musume. They were around longest (since before even H!P was), and had the largest fanbase. But if Berryz and C-ute are now the most senior units in H!P, then it wouldn't be completely unwarranted to ask whether or not Berryz Koubou is now the new flagship unit.

An idea compelling to many of us Beriwota. Though I doubt the Morning Musume fans reading this are quite so eager to concede that. And their arguements are valid. It has been a long time since I even paid attention to numbers like sales figures, but, unless I'm not mistaken, Morning Musume still maintains the lead on that, and as the traditional flagship group, it would be strange to transfer that accolade onto another.

But the point is that, with us now entering into a new decade, it might be interesting to see how the commonly held conceptions of the past decade hold up, and what changes we can expect to see in the coming years.

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Idol Collections

It's a strange topic. Kurisu from Mexican idol blog Hello!Wota once said that "Americans are not wota. Americans are collectors." Is that true? I'm not here to debate the distinction or the true nature of being a wota. At least not now. I've done that in the past, and I'm sure it'll crop up time and time again, but today I'm focusing on the "collector".

After all, short of seeing them in concert, nothing makes you feel closer to your Idol than when that knock at the door comes and the courier delivers your H!P goods, right? 

And why shouldn't it? That drive we have to buy our Idol's merchandise is, after all, the thing that enables them to continue releasing more of it.

But that's not really the end of the story, is it? I've noticed that different people can take very different attitudes towards their collections. Starting with the moment it arrives.

I'm sure many of us have that new goods ritual. The first thing we do when that package is in our hands. My friend and co-subber in KIDS, Wolfy, informed me that he planned to record an unpacking video when his first photobook arrived. It's not really something I had ever considered doing myself - but, sure enough, if you look hard enough, you'll find plenty of people who do this for every new item they get.

My 'ritual' came about mostly by chance. Those of you who have added me on facebook might know what it is. When I get a new package, I open it, and then arrange all the new items so that they are resting on my happi and take a photo of them. Simple, I know. But it originally came about because I didn't have anywhere to put them to take a photo.

The carpet was far from clean, and I was too lazy to go correct this just to take a photo, so I put down something on top of it, which I could safely rest my new CDs on. That just happened to be my happi. 

I'd repeat this same process every time I got new stuff, until eventually it just kind of became a tradition for me to do this. It's a bit like putting a signature in a photo. As much as I've become so inseparably associated with my avatar (oft called "the Church of Maasa symbol thingy"), my Idol merch pics have become associated with that happi and it wouldn't feel right now if I was to stop using it.

But what of the ever-prevailing question of keeping them unopened? A collector's penchant for that all-important "mint condition" is well known. But does it apply to Hello!Project?

I don't think it does. They're not necessarily wrong, of course. They're entitled to do whatever they wish with their stuff. What I mean to say is that I don't subscribe to their belief that items must remain sealed and in mint condition. I don't even mind if they're not like that when I buy them (though if I pay for a brand new copy, I do expect to get one that's in good condition - I'm looking at you, YesAsia.)

I buy H!P merch firstly to support my Idol, and secondly because I want to. I've bought plenty of items second-hand from Yahoo JP auctions or from Hello! Online trading threads. The first argument doesn't apply to that, because I'm not actually giving any money to UFA when I buy those second-hand goods. But I do buy them because I want them. 

On a similar note, there are also some incredible eccentrics out there. Himalia once told me of his most prized collection pieces. A signed copy of Morning Musume's demo single Ai no Tane... with a number indicating that it was the very first one sold. That's the kind of item that most collectors drool over. But then there's the other piece. An airtight jar, which was sealed at the Elder Club graduation concert the moment when his Idol, Nakazawa Yuko, graduated from Hello!Project. That's a pretty curious collection piece. Worthless to most, but priceless to him. 

We all knew that Himalia was a crazy collector of assorted H!P goods. But that shows just how crazy - but I'll be damned if it doesn't make a good anecdote. 

So, have you guys got any curiosities yourself?

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Berryz to attend AnimeNEXT

Seriously? I can't believe it. Mere hours after I wrote "I'm still holding out for Berryz to get invited to Japan Expo" in my previous entry about Buono's concert in Paris this February, news broke that they have been invited to a tiny convention on the US' east coast by the name of AnimeNEXT.

My dreams for this year are shattered.

But maybe I can still put them back together.

While I wasn't too keen on the idea initially (and didn't even consider going to their Sakuracon performance for the same reason), I may find a way to attend. America has generally been in the realm of the darkest, most cob-webbed corners - and filed with a do not want sticker - of the "countries to visit" list that I'm sure everyone compiles at some point whether physically or mentally.

And yet, this time something appeals to me.

When I went to Japan Expo for Morning Musume, I had the time of my life, that is true. And much of what made it so was the people I was with. Team Awesome, as Lolli named us. But I still knew that I was a Berryz fan in a sea of Momusu freaks. I still feel guilty that JunJun thought I was wearing one of her concert shirts when it was a Maasa one. So what would happen if it had been a Berryz event?

I seemed to get recognised a great deal when I was at PJX. "You're Dran, right? I read your blog!" and so on. I also feel guilty that many of the people who said this to me, I didn't recognise either. Some of them I did know after they told me their name. But they put me at a disadvantage by recognising me by my awesome good looks. Well... you know.

Would I be more recognised in a crowd of Berryz fans? Would I recognise more people? Who knows. It's an experiment that sounds fun to try though.

And then there's the crowning moment. That which I would see Sudou Maasa for the first time in person. No thought has ever been so compelling to me. For 3 years now I've been referred to as Pope Dran of the Church of Maasa (a title I'm not all that fond of. Sounds too.... pope-y.) And yet, I've never so much as laid eyes on her. Does that make me qualified to be Church leader?

Oh well. The US is still very far indeed. A lot of money, which could be better spent saving for Japan. I have no idea yet if I can afford to go there, at any rate. But we'll see. If I can, it'll be just as tight-cut as it would be to go see Buono. More expensive, perhaps. But also further away. A bit like the sun and moon. The sun is 400 times larger than the moon, but also 400 times further away. So from our perspective, they appear to be the same size in the sky.

The convention will run in Somerset, New Jersey from the 8th of June to the 10th, I believe.

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Buono! Concert in Europe... again!

It has been 2 years now since Buono! announced their ill-fated trip to Stockholm to perform at the Japan Expo. Now, in early 2012, they're planning to make a second attempt at performing in Europe.

Back then I was pretty excited. It was to be the first time that any Hello! Project group was to perform outside of Asia. That was big news. Morning Musume were set to appear a few months later at Anime Expo, but the first would be Buono! And in Europe! I was determined to go.

Despite my parents insisting that I couldn't actually afford to go, I managed to convince them otherwise, and everything was booked. Flights, accomodation, Expo tickets. As time drew nearer, and our excitement grew exponentially with it, we were utterly distraught by the cancellation.

It didn't turn out too bad though. A group os us who had already paid for everything went anyway, and had a good time which became the first (and, unfortunately, only) Eurowota event. But even now that dejection in the wake of the cancellation announcement still haunts me.

And now that we have a second shot?

I... don't care.

It's not that I don't want to go. I do. But that sense of urgency that was there with the Stockholm visit just isn't there. I don't really feel like it's in any way imperative that I'm actually there.

So I'm not sure if I actually intend to go. With some pretty awesome book-keeping, I'm certain that I could pull it off. But I'm still holding out for Berryz to get invited to Japan Expo. It's a small hope, perhaps. But I know that if they do announce it after I've commited to going to see Buono, I won't have the money to see Berryz. And I'd be kicking myself from here to Calais if that happened.

Who knows. Maybe I'm holding out for something that will never happen. Maybe I'm a fool to do so.

It's still possible that I'll attend this concert. After all, I was initially very indifferent towards the idea of going to see Morning Musume at PJX. But when I did go I had a great time. Most fun I've ever had, if I'm honest. But at present, I'm very much sitting on the fence with this.

That said, for those of you who aren't sat on the fence, it's set to take place on the 12th of February, at Le Machine du Moulin Rouge, at the heart of Paris' entertainment districts.

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Expanding horizons?

This week the Daily Yomiuri featured an article about the potential for overseas expansion of Japanese pop culture, including a few comments from Takahashi Ai. 

I felt I wanted to weigh in with my own perspective.

The main focus of the article seemed to be an the apparent boom of popularity enjoyed by South Korean artists at the moment. While a decade ago it was cool to like Morning Musume, it certainly appears that schoolgirls all over Asia are managing to prop up this titan of an industry. It's suddenly trendy. We could could several Japanese public figures, including current and former Hello! Project members who have also bought into the Korean wave.

But why?

I'm not fooling anyone by claiming that I'm an expert on Korean Idols. I've quite famously made a point of hating them. Not really out of dislike for Korean people (though it's not above me to joke that I do), or even out of a superiority complex about Jpop. It's actually a whole lot more simple than that. It's musical taste.

Where the music that Tsunku writes for Hello! Project mirrors the rock music that influenced him and that he wrote in SharanQ, the very little Kpop I've heard tends to ignore the rock genre completely - instead focusing on a more R&B-influenced approach.

And that's my problem. I'm a rock kind of guy. I have never been a fan of R&B or Hip-Hop, or it's other various shoot-off genres. And, frankly, I hope I never feel the need to become a fan of those genres.

In the article, Takahashi claimed that the reason for the incredible momentum that various Korean Idol groups are seizing the world is that Japanese Idols just don't have the same drive for global success whereas Korean artists tend to be much more goal-orientated, pushing themselves onward in the hopes of achieving those dreams.

A lovely thought. And I have no idea as to the veracity of the statement on Korean people, but her analysis on the Japanese psyche seems to have hit the nail on the head.

In general, Japanese Idols aren't driven by desire for world domination (or at least, aren't seen to be), but rather a desire to please their fans.

It seems to be a very Japanese thing. Being content with one's lot. Instead of hoping for massive success around the world, they hope to maintain the fans they already have. It also reflects in the agency. Where rival agencies spend big money in the hopes of generating a big payoff of new fans, UFA has, instead, opted to cut costs in the knowledge that they can get buy with larger profits on the fans they already have.

In a way, it also sounds like the difference between the US and British approach to the recession. But that's another story entirely.

Does that make the respective fans seem more or less important? Do the Korean artists take their fans for granted while the fans of the Japanese Idols know that their oshi is working hard for them?

I honestly have no idea.

But the last line in the article proved to be a clincher.

When I ask young people in China why Hanryu idols are so popular in there, I always get the simple reply: "Because they come here."

This is a concept which, unfortunately, the Japanese still haven't fully grasped.

Whenever a western fan's interest in Hello!Project seems to decline, and I've seen this happen, all it often takes to restore that interest is a concert. This especially helps when that fan has been in isolation. Meeting other fans and seeing one's Idol in person often prove to be the jumpleads that one's fandom needed.

It's true that Hello!Project still haven't fully understood how to exploit this budding overseas popularity, but if they took it upon themselves to organise concerts and events, rather than waiting to be invited by Japan Expo or Anime Expo, who knows what would happen!

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Is S/mileage Doomed?

In the aftermath of the Yuuka graduation announcement, this is something that many blogs (even International Wota - though was perhaps said with more irony than truth) said. Yuuka graduating = death of S/mileage.

Is it the case? I really don't think so.

That isn't how this industry works. If a graduation, even of a popular member, signalled the end of the group, then I'm afraid to say Hello! Project would have died very early on. Instead we find that our favourite groups are still going strong.

The truth is that, while the Yuuka and Saki leaving H!P is a great loss for S/mileage, it's not the end of the world for the group. Those fans who don't find a new favourite member will vanish, sure, but that's not so much a loss for S/mileage as a loss for those fans.

Remember when S/mileage's major debut was first announced? What was it, 10k smile photo submissions in a week or something? They passed that challenge with flying colours. Not just by the dedication of the fans who sent in their own photos and spread the word, but by the dedication of the girls themselves, who went out onto the streets of Tokyo trying to drum up support for themselves.

If those girls hadn't done their best back then, S/mileage wouldn't exist. If those girls weren't doing their best right now, S/mileage wouldn't exist.

But because they are constantly striving to give it their all in the name of the fans, they will continue to exist long after Yuuka is gone.

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More Graduations? Yuuka to leave Hello! Project?

A story published in one morning newspaper in Japan has just caused a frenzy online.

It reports that 1st Generation S/mileage member, Maeda Yuuka, is set to graduate on the 31st of December this year.

Apparently she commented that the wants to leave her duties in Hello! Project in order to focus on her schooling, so that she can get into a good university.

It wouldn't be the first time a member has graduated to go to university. Konno Asami being a pretty well-known example. In fact, schooling is a pretty standard excuse. More often than not it's the one given out by talent agencies when they'd rather not go into too much detail.

It hasn't been confirmed as yet. So it will be interesting to see just whether or not it turns out to be a hoax. Curious is the date chosen. It's traditional for a member to leave during a concert tour, but there is no concerts running in late December, as far as I'm aware. The Winter tour begins in January.

Perhaps it's fake. Perhaps not. 

More on this when (if) Tsunku posts his comments.

EDIT: An official announcement just appeared on the Hello!Project site.

The story is true. It says that she decided to attend high school and remain in S/mileage, but was struggling to do both. And, as she has a desire to attend college after High School, she has decided to leave the company and focus full-time on school, as it would not be fair on her fans if she wasn't giving them her 100%.

I must admit, I hate it when rumours like this prove to be more than just rumours. But we'll continue to support her and wish her luck in her academic life after she graduates.

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Michishige Sayumi - Sayuminglandoll Previews

By now, we've had quite a few previews released of Sayu's upcoming photobook, as release bears down on us from less than a week away.

The PB certainly takes a unique approach, when compared with other photobooks of Sayu's, or H!P photobooks in general.

Interestingly, the PB seems to be quite heavily influenced by 60s media, photography and fashion, and such. Even the excessive use of bright girlish colours like pink and yellow.

Though, in those last two pictures, we can see that the colour isn't maintained the whole way through. For W Saki, Nakajima came up with the idea of having a black book and a white book, and the theme and colours gradually change through the PB from one to the other. Perhaps Sayumi liked the idea?

Sayu has always liked giving us two versions of herself. The cutesy, almost tsundere, character and the more adult, sexy Sayumi. I guess it's that double-faceted nature of her PBs that make them work so well.

That said though, I'm not really liking this PB so far. It definitely feels quite unique, but also somewhat more pretentious than the normal H!P photobook. But I'll just have to see how the rest goes.

Hopefully we won't have to wait too long. The PB is released this Thursday, so if there are going to be more previews before then, they'll turn up shortly.

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Okai Chisato 2nd DVD "Imp Girl"

This week we had UP FRONT revealing previews for Okai Chisato's new DVD, titled "Imp Girl".

It's been almost a year now since the release of her first solo DVD, "Chissa~". And, although it was right at the peak of H!P's dreaded Image Videos, it still proved to be a pretty good release - especially for the numerous Chisato fans out there.

It was one of those releases that we, at KIDS, had decided to work on almost immediately after it was announced - in fairly spectacular fashion at that. If I remember correctly, it was announced live on her livestream show when they started running footage from the Making DVD, and blew the minds of the several thousand fans who were watching.

Now, this isn't an announcement that we're also going to sub this DVD, but it's a very real possibility. With Hyakupa gone, that leaves us as the premier H!PKids fansubbing group, and who better to sub it than us?

I'll have to speak to the others about it. I'm certain it'll mostly depend on our ability to source a copy, though.

They have also revealed that the DVD, like most Special Making ofs, will be 50 minutes long.

This does mean that I won't expect a full Solo DVD of the calibre we used to get. This will probably be another Image Video. That means 30 minutes of a few lines and watching them shoot the DVD, and perhaps 15 or so minutes worth of an interview, in line with some of the more recent DVDs we've seen Hello! Project produce.

Fanclub orders will run for 3 weeks starting from today, closing on the 7th of November, with the DVD expected to release sometime in December.

A fanclub release only, it would appear. But two years ago I detailed my own method of joining the fanclub - officially restricted to only those with a Japanese postal address. So it's not impossible. It does still beg the question of when, if ever, UFA will get around to updating their registration process to the modern era, and hopefully opening the fanclub to those in overseas countries.

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The Difficulties of Fansubbing: Brand Loyalty

In this (likely to be final part of the series) entry I'll be talking about what happens after we've finished working on a project and release it, and how predicting response is near impossible.

High viewership ratings is not something we aim for. I always use the logic that, if we were, we wouldn't be subbing Hello!Pro Kids releases. We are there simply because we want to fansub. However, that doesn't mean we don't read the response to our releases, or watch those download figures go up.

Why? We get some form of enjoyment out of watching them. We'll say, "Oh, look! This Nakky release is almost beating our Momo release!" And we imagine some sort of internal race amongst the projects we put out, to see who will fare better than its opponents. Outside of that little game, it doesn't actually have any influence at all on how we do things.

But for the purpose of this blog, I'm going to try to break down the various factors which decide how popular your release will be, and why this makes it unpredictable.

First, the most obvious factor is which members are involved. It's no secret that member popularity can be heavily lop-sided with, say, an Airi release drawing more people and a Kanna release. But how do you know which members have a higher following, and will attract more downloads? It's not easy. Your own perception of different members' popularity is often coloured by your choice of Idol. Most people feel that their Idol isn't as popular as they could be and won't hesitate to cry when someone they perceive to be more popular unjustly gets more lines or screen time. We've all been there at some point.

So you need a more unbiased approach. How about an opinion poll? These are all over the Internet, and many provide differing results. How large was the pool of people who voted? Was voting for multiple members allowed? What about voting multiple times? Should that be allowed? You might argue that it provides a more accurate index of fan dedication than a normal 1 vote/person system. 

 

Whatever you think, Hello!Blog's annual H!P member ranking poll is the best source of information, having, by far, the most publicity (as well as offering various voter incentives) and largest voter pool for more accurate results. Paul Thomas works hard to weed out any multiple votes and provides meticulous breakdowns of the results. Which member is most popular in which country, which member is most popular among each gender group, what the largest demographic of voters was, etc. 

 

But even this staggering amount of statistical data isn't truly enough to predict which members will net your project the most downloads. 

Although it provides the most accurate results in terms of the percentage of the community polled, it still doesn't have anywhere near the voter turnout you need to come to any concrete decision. If you held a general election and only 20% of the electorate turned up to vote, even if the leading party won by a huge margin, you'd still wonder what would have happened had the voter turnout been at 80%.

And then opinions change. Hello!Blog's member ranking finds out who your top ten members are. But most people only have definite choices for the first three or four members. After that it becomes very arbitrary. A person's 8th favourite member may be the 4th favourite 3 weeks later, or may have fallen off the top ten entirely.

But let's say that you have worked out which members will give you your best chance at a high download count. Does that put the cat in the bag?

Not quite.

Another factor is simply down to competition. How many other versions of the video are there available? It stands to reason that, if you release and there are no other options, such as DRIPs or RAWs, for people who want that video, then they'll download your subbed version because it is the first to appear. But if people have just downloaded a 7gb ISO of the same file the day before, they are much less likely to grab it again just to see it subbed. Similarly, I've seen cases where the subs and the first DRIP to appear showed up within the same hour. You'd think the subtitled version would get all of the hits leaving the DRIP out in the rain, but, for whatever reason, many people still opted for the DRIP.

Also factoring into this whether you are the first to release or not is simply whether people deem it to be worthwhile. If they grabbed and watched the RAW, and didn't think much of it, they'll say "It's not really worth grabbing it again just to see it subbed." If you release first, those people won't know what to expect. If the DVD turns out to be boring, they'll have to grab the subbed version before they're aware that it's not very good.

So what about the amount of work that went into it? Curiously, this doesn't seem to have much effect at all. Perhaps it's just because the more work you put in, the higher your expectations. We learned very early on that doing extra doesn't guarantee that you'll get extra hits. The KIDS project which, by far, had the most work involved was our release of Hagiwara Mai in Hachijoujima. With our effects and onscreen text matching up beautifully to the video, and with the increased difficulty of doing the only subtitles for an audio commentary outside of the two (three if you include the unreleased C-ute Alo-Hello) done by ICU-Subs. We were a new group at the time, and expected this to get a huge response, but, perhaps simply due to the other factors involved, the response it got was actually pretty underwhelming. Even now, 11 months on, it is still one of our lowest-downloaded releases (and, if you ask us, one of our best!).

Anyway, so you put a lot of hard work into getting your fun Aichan (or whomever) DVD out there first. Surely now you're assured a huge response?

While you've certainly got a good shot at it, the thing which will ultimately decide your reception is the label you attach to it, and the packaging you wrap it in. In short, your brand.

It's something which I don't like to acknowledge much. That is, the idea that names or brands are important. But there's definitely evidence, however circumstantial, to support the idea.

If we take a look at some of the best and most successful fansub groups we've seen in H!P fandom, you'll start to understand what I mean.

Take HPS, to start with. Said to be the oldest H!P fansub group, they made their home at Hello! Online, and made good use of the facilities provided of them, seizing an exclusive spot at the top of the tracker (which only recently was given over to all subgroups), and an exclusive part of the forum for them to talk to each other and to the fans. HPS became like the BBC of the subbing world. Those three letters come with an assurance of quality, in both the video and in the translations. And so, even if we don't realise it (or even if they don't), we are psychologically drawn to their releases because, even though they may be somewhat old-fashioned now, we're certain that it'll be an excellent release.

Now look at Hello!Fansubs and ICU. Where ICU built themselves on the charisma of He-Hulk, making good use of his knowledgability and sheer rhetoric, as well as constantly pushing the image of being a fresh new group, doing things in ways that were unique and had never been attempted before. 

Hello!Fansubs utilised charisma in a slightly different approach. Rather than clever marketing and impressive rhetoric, they had a leader in SacredCultivator who communicated with the fans. He would go to forums and talk to people, responding to their comments. He, and those fans, made great use of YouTube, back when it was still a fairly new site with a more cult following, posting up their subtitled PVs and talking with people in the comments. You could add him on Facebook, PM him on H!O and join the H!F forums, and he would talk to you.

And the torrent comments? Yeah. He might respond to those too.

And so, in a way that I don't think any other H!P fansubber has done before or since, he not only managed to create a hugely successful brand out of Hello!Fansubs, but also out of the name SacredCultivator. He has done joint projects and guest work for many groups, both in and out of H!P fandom. And generally, even without He-Hulk-esque rhetoric, people will grab it. Whether it's a 10minute PV making with only 5 lines of dialogue, or an hour and a half's worth of Alo-Hello footage.

Is it any wonder that H!F have become, arguably, the most successful H!P fansub group ever? Despite becoming ever increasingly old-fashioned themselves (Still releasing XVID?), SC built a brand from scratch and still manages to maintain decent figures. Not as high as they once were, but actually, the average has dropped across the board.

So what can you do? Will you get high figures when you just start out? You might. We didn't. But if you keep at it, I'm sure people will become familiar with your group's name and begin to trust the work that you do.

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