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Idol Economics: Television, Affective and Virtual Models in Japan

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Idology in Transcultural Perspective

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Abstract

This chapter sketches the commercial dimensions of idols. Positioned in contemporary Japan, the author identifies three major paradigms since the 1970s, namely the integrated media-commodity system or television model, the direct experience or affective model and the virtual model. In the wake of a deteriorating television model, dominated by male idols such as SMAP and Arashi since the 2000s, there is tension today between the competing affective and virtual models, specifically concerning the demand for bodies and authenticity, but both are proving enormously successful. This chapter presents the contrasting examples of AKB48 and Hatsune Miku, as well as their historical predecessors Onyanko Club and “two-dimensional idols.” Importantly, Japan is not unique—even something as seemingly novel as “virtual reality characters” can be traced back to England in the late 1800s—but rather serves as a well-developed case study of pop idolatry for comparative analysis.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    While online platforms and social media raise the potential of other models, these have been less pronounced in the case of idol economics in Japan. It appears that online platforms and social media more often than not overlap and operate together with the television, affective and virtual models. See, for example, the discussion of net idols in Lukács 2015. For more on micro-celebrities and self-branding outside Japan, see Marwick 2013.

  2. 2.

    Clearly Japan is not unique in the demand for authenticity, which was already becoming visible in the United States in the 1910s when the public sought information on the private lives of stars or sought to discover the “authentic person” rather than “fictional character” (Gross 2003: 98). Star and celebrity watchers often scrutinize performances and media appearances for signs of the “real person” (Gamson 1994: 163; Karlin 2012: 82). Today, celebrities are even more exposed via talk shows and social media, allowing viewers to feel like they know them intimately.

  3. 3.

    Originally even cheaper, at the time of this writing, a ticket costs only 3400 yen (2400 yen for minors and women). In fact, estimated revenue does not cover the operational costs of the AKB48 Theater (Sakakura 2014: 31). The point is not to make money on ticket sales, but to stage an encounter between idols and fans, cultivate an intimate and intense relationship between them and then capitalize on it.

  4. 4.

    Notably, the model is not limited to female idols. There are underground/indies male idol groups that, in exchange for purchasing CDs and other commodities, will talk with fans, hug them and even mock kiss with only a finger separating lips (Excite News 2018). This brings to mind “host clubs,” where customers make purchases to be close to attractive men and maintain relationships with them (Takeyama 2016).

  5. 5.

    Many of the practices associated with fan culture today such as fan art and fiction, fan clubs, critical commentaries, conventions, costuming as characters and pilgrimages to places associated with the characters all appeared as part of “the cult of Holmes” (Saler 2012: 107). If today fans in Japan (if not the Japanese people tout court) are often reported to be bizarre for loving fictional characters, precisely the same thing was said about Holmes fans. Saler reports one critic writing: “Does anything puzzle a foreigner more…than the enthusiasm with which our learned men…investigate the character and career of […] purely imaginary persons?” (Saler 2012: 106).

  6. 6.

    There is a deeper point to be made here. In his writing on straight-to-video releases and fan-oriented anime, historian Jonathan Clements provocatively states, “It is, arguably, productive to regard developments in ‘adult’ Japanese animation in the 1980s and 1990s from the perspective of pornography not as a periphery, but as a core, to which other titles need to find some sort of stylistic connection” (Clements 2013: 171). This is not to trot out the tired cliché of anime as porn or “Japanese porn,” but rather to highlight its focus on affective “intensities” and “grabs” (see Paasonen 2011), which places anime alongside “body genres” (Williams 1989: 5). This line of thinking is pursued by media theorist Rayna Denison in her critical introduction to anime and/as genre (Denison 2015: 52–54, 59, 113–115). For more on anime affect, exploitation and “fan service,” specifically involving cute girl characters such as Lum, see Galbraith 2021.

  7. 7.

    Fans of this type can be quite explicit in stating that, “I don’t care what the real person is doing,” as one did in defining idols to me as literal “idols” (gūzō), as opposed to the standard English loanword “idols” (aidoru) (Galbraith 2009: 24). In this linguistic shift, the fan positioned himself as engaged in literal “idolatry” (gūzō sūhai).

  8. 8.

    There is an earlier history to computer-generated character idols, which is not necessarily as tied to manga, anime and fan activities. Before Terai Yuki came Date Kyōko (a.k.a. DK-96), a computer-generated polygon character developed by Horipro Inc., a major agency for female models and celebrities, and debuted in 1996. Although never really a hit, Date Kyōko appeared on radio and television shows and eventually released CDs and music videos. As indicated by the involvement of television, the media played along with Horipro Inc. as part of “the Great Game,” and they repeated the official biographical information that Date Kyōko was scouted while working at a hamburger stand in suburban Tokyo. For his part, Date Kyōko’s producer was inspired by the buzz around Fujisaki Shiori and his earlier involvement with the human yet still virtual Haga Yui, who was created as a joke but nevertheless debuted as an idol in 1990. With her face concealed (via a black bar over her eyes in television, video and photo appearances), Haga Yui had no fixed identity; an estimated 57 different women played her. At a handshake event, which suggests the affective model, Haga Yui remained behind a curtain and only a human hand poked out; at concerts, her voice could be heard “live,” but only as a recording being played back; when fans showed up to have their idol sign her photo book, they could finally see her face, but it had multiplied into three attached to three women seated side by side and all introduced as the idol character. While perhaps some naïvely believed that Haga Yui was “real,” most were in on the joke and followed along as part of the fiction game, itself a version of believing in Holmes as part of “the Great Game.”

  9. 9.

    Just as one can seek fiction in reality, one can also seek reality in fiction. In his work on representations of idols in manga, anime and games, art historian Yoshida Masataka notes a distinct strain emphasizing the seedy underbelly of the industry and suffering of performers, especially women (Yoshida 2016: 147). A particularly fine example is Key the Metal Idol (Kii za metaru aidoru, 1994–1997), which depicts a world where men trick women into appearing in pornography and powerful sponsors brutally beat performers and force them into soul-sucking machines to operate idol automatons. The anime also astutely observes religious dimensions of idols and connects them to Shintō priestesses and rituals, mechanical dolls and so on. In the fiction, then, we see realities of abuse of the flesh in service of the image, as well as channeling of spiritual and social energies through idol performances.

  10. 10.

    Media theorist Thomas Lamarre is prescient: “The contemporary paradigm of media care exercised through media addiction and signaletic toxicity is hardly cause for optimism, and care for self seems a thin thread for articulating social transformation, whether revolutionary or reformist. Because care for self appears inextricable from work on self and thus from neoliberal self-governance and sovereign autonomies, it may appear to be a simple compensatory mechanism, a fleeting moment of anarchy and collectivity” (Lamarre 2018: 202). He nevertheless highlights potential “in parasocial movements in the translation or transmigration of characters or personas between individuals’ rooms and special urban zones as well as other sites. To understand this transmigration, we cannot simply linger on, pathologize, or otherwise reify the relationship between consumers and characters. [… W]e need to address the media infrastructures that mediate this relationship” (Lamarre 2018: 202).

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  1. Senshū University, Tokyo, Japan

    Patrick W. Galbraith

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  1. Kokushikan University, Tokyo, Japan

    Aoyagi Hiroshi

  2. Senshū University, Tokyo, Japan

    Patrick W. Galbraith

  3. Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong

    Mateja Kovacic

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Galbraith, P.W. (2021). Idol Economics: Television, Affective and Virtual Models in Japan. In: Hiroshi, A., Galbraith, P.W., Kovacic, M. (eds) Idology in Transcultural Perspective. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-82677-2_4

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