[GENERAL] The AKB48 Thread

If I remember correctly, Johnny was once charged with rapes as parents of 2 trainees reported him. There had to be some formal investigation albeit going no where as victims were paid hush money later.

If it were just NGT's members doing then what that had to do with AKB? No AKB's member involved in the incident yet they were penalized for it? Nice logic there.

Did you truly believe AKB had "sold out" or "twitter/yahoo trend" power before the Maho debacle? Someone brought up the case of Hayakawa. Has Nogi been scratched over this controversy? No sponsor withdrawn so far. Did Nogi had that TV appearance banning power of Johnny?

What a fantasy. No big showbiz company needs no sponsor.

You did say Akimoto invested no passion in 48 because he was having fun with new toys. I simply replied that he seemed to enjoy those neither.

I read that to declare there was "serious injury", the company was subjected to official probe.

In my country, there is a certain specified scope of "serious" injury such as, impaired visibility, the loss of olfactory sense, the loss of organs such as finger, arm, toe, many teeth etc. What happened to Kakehashi was the loss of 2 teeth and the paralysis on a side of her face (no broken face bone). The loss of 2 teeth certainly was not serious and, unless the law had especially specified otherwise, the paralysis on the face could be legally listed as "light". What happened there was likely more of exploitation of legal ambiguity avoid a legal hassle. Something you rather expected every single company in the world practice.

But, a more serious issue was in hindsight, the compromised concert safety. How did Kakehashi get injured in the first place? Was there safety leniency? No way Seigo could be lenient alone as the music company must review the stage plan and every safety measures beforehand. If the leniency on music company persists, another serious accident is pending regardless Seigo's withdrawal.

When we say a person is corrupted, it means that person habitually commits something immoral. It can be animal abuse, polyamory etc. So, exploitation of teenage girls is corruption in a broader sense.

Fans may refuse to look deeper for their own comfort. MNLoves (MNL48's fans) were prime example. Parents of members threatened to report HHE, MNL's agency, to Department of Labor for long overdue wages. MNLoves responded with rage against the parents and members, saying they had to be sympathetic, it was difficult to start a showbiz company of these many employees. If MNLoves agreed that HHE was in the wrong, to buy any more goods, to attend any more event, would intentionally support "criminal" thus, bad psychological conflict. On the other hand, they could just shift their support to another member or just wait until new members were added.

Seigo could get his job done within given budget and time frame. Thus, he was competent at his work. However he treated the performer is a different topic of morality. DH hiring a capable outsource in no way was an incompetence.

If that opinion, "what happens to 46 affects AKB" is true, the opposite, "what happens to 48 affects Nogizaka", also is correct but, it isn't. Besides, the effect of Keyakizaka fiasco limited only to its direct successor, Sakurazaka.

So, it has been nothing interesting for ages, huh?

 

Rest in Peace Natsu-sensei.
She was in charge of dance choreography from the very start (Aki-P asked her to help, she was in the first gen audition as one of the judge) up until Yuuhi wo Miteiruka.
I also read that she was the one who picked and pushed Acchan. (from here)

 

Same company at the time.
Very long documented thread below:
http://stage48.net/forum/index.php?threads/ngt48-assault-case.22622/

 

Nikkan Sports has tweeted a photo of Natsu-sensei with Sae at RH 2013 when 'Kiseki wa Ma ni Awanai' (which she performed with Jurina and Micha) came second:
https://twitter.com/nikkan_ohtomo/status/1676883936943960064



(2nd photo is from https://twitter.com/hxHcj9RwnVyA0MO/status/1676928778952671233)

 

Indeed. Also it doesnt matter what we think. Obviously the sponsors thought otherwise. Since then many sponsors distance themselves from akb group. Some did it in more subtle way (the japanese way), but some surprisingly outright said it and even made a statement about it.

Anyway, condolences. For sure , akb wouldnt even exist for these long without her. I bet she has a role in stopping members who want to quit the group at ths time

 

rest in peace, natsu-sensei. thank you for giving us some of akb’s most iconic choreographies. i hope you can rest comfortably now.

 

AKB48 will be at @.JAM Expo 2023 on Aug 26 !

https://twitter.com/at_jam/status/1677150510892322818
While STU48 NMB48 NGT48 will be on Aug 27.
I wonder what lineup they'll send this year? (note : last year's setlist)

https://atjam.jp/expo2023/lineup

Addition: Comments by Goodwill Ambassador/MC, former SKE48 Suda Akari:

if the video does not show watch the video here

EDIT: apologies to user @jam that I inadvertently mentioned while typing the title of the event.

=================
Also AKB48 will be on TBS Ongaku no Hi next week, Jul 15!
https://twitter.com/AKB48_staff/status/1677302256432193536
Lineup and song(s) unknown yet.
The next day is National Fanmeeting in Osaka, so it is speculated that the appearance time won't be late at night.

 

I know this is auto-translated but this is the slogan we talked about on Discord as well: it actually goes "beams from your eyes, power from your hands and aura from your pores."

 

AKB48 will be on TV Asahi's music program 『The MusiQuest』 on Aug 27 !

https://twitter.com/themusiquest/status/1678252706283114504
https://twitter.com/AKB48_staff/status/1678253269452468224
https://ameblo.jp/akihabara48/entry-12811140391.html

It's still more than a month away, but they already have the participating members list? Surprising!
Featuring:

Basically current senbatsu, minus Hiichan and Berin. Instead, Kururun and Shitao are participating!

 

https://twitter.com/HEARTSTATION648/status/1678368812889178112
https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1678368657532162048/pu/vid/1120x628/eLxa8eONIqyRllCi.mp4

https://twitter.com/Kashiwagi_Yumi/status/1678418852596662278
https://video.twimg.com/ext_tw_video/1678418641753198592/pu/vid/1280x720/LTrn4VWznnMj0W1u.mp4

Team B CM.

 

So, was it the company or the member's fault? Sou said it was the later.

 

You want anyone to read for you ?

 

>213 pages

It's not like reading it would make him any more enlightened.

It's complicated. Most of what people believe about the case is little more than speculation and Q-Anon-tier red string twirling. But here's a summary anyway.

Spoiler: summary

Some members got too friendly with fans. Some of those fans were bad people, and used their access to find out private information and stalk the members. They'd done this before in other groups and gotten banned for it, but for some reason Etsuro & co. hadn't yet gotten around to it in Niigata. Perhaps something to do with NGT's geographical isolation and comparatively smaller fanbase. At the same time, Etsuro seems to have fostered an atmosphere of conflict among the members, formalized by the division into Team NIII and G (cliques form naturally, but other groups use shuffles to split them apart instead). He did something similar in SKE too, claiming the drama made them better at variety.

Then the assault happens, the two men responsible make a bunch of excuses to Maho (some are provably misleading, all are vague), she grills them on what they said (though that doesn't really get anywhere), then takes it to Etsuro and demands he fire all the members who'd been consorting with fans. That is, fire half the group including most of the popular members. He does some kind of survey to see how widespread the problem is... and then drops it. Maho takes it public. The members she wanted fired don't immediately leap to her defense. The new idiots brought in from Tokyo to fix things think making Maho apologize in the theater is a Good Idea(tm). Things deteriorate further.

Management absolutely bungled their response, and I also think they should have done more beforehand to protect the members, including providing secure dorms (apparently the NGT "dorms" were just apartments rented on one floor shared with the general public) and mediating disputes between the members better. They also should have discouraged consorting with fans, obviously, but all indications are that this problem was widespread across 48G at the time, and in the upper management's haste to retire the love ban they seem to have forgotten why it was there in the first place. So in that sense it was the company's "fault". But at the end of the day the blame lies squarely on the shoulders of the two men who assaulted Maho, and their group of stalkers. Members made mistakes too but nothing to deserve the hate they've since received.

Spoiler

I think the degree to which the NGT48 scandal was a love ban scandal gets downplayed a lot among international audiences, in favour of made up narratives of bullying and conspiracy. But it's still very much alive in Japanese circles. Most of the people I had to block on Twitter for constantly bashing Naachan after her scandal had something in support of Maho on their profile, and/or had previous spent most of their time tweeting about that.

 

You surely need that more than me. I'll waive for you.

Mostly agree but not the love ban part.
The intimate personal relationship between fans and idols is not always romantic.
Most chika idol groups in Thailand have these such problems, members give special treatments to big-spender fans (such as Line chat), resulting classism within fandom. Now that the fandom has been shrinking, this problem has reached BNK48 as the agency is less strict on this (to encourage big fans to spend more).

 

First in a series of 4 daily videos with Erii and Mogi from DELISH KITCHEN:


if the video does not show watch the video here

 

I feel like AKB48 will be at The First Take to celebrate 10 years anniversary of Koisuru Fortune Cookie but which members should be included?

 

Second daily video from DELISH KITCHEN with Erii and Mogi:


if the video does not show watch the video here

 

I like Hiichan but...

I feel like she is missing a lot on akb shows?

I know she has tv jobs but surely that isnt a detterent against participating?

Is she going overseas soon?

Berin also didnt participate at the concert right