Quote from: PyronIkari on September 28, 2011, 10:31:58 AMWell if you didn't know, when they came to Anime Expo, only 16 came. I do believe that they can pay for themselves again, I'm pretty sure AKB48 isn't a dirt poor group. They're pretty successful. 16 would still be a lot right? 16 tickets from Japan and back + hotel rooms would probably be around $20,000. If AKB48 couldn't pay for themselves to get here, how did they get to both LA and NYC in the first place?Quote from: Narzake on September 28, 2011, 12:45:55 AMQuote from: Momoko on June 10, 2011, 12:10:38 PM
I would love it if AKB48 could come to Fanime as well! <3 I missed out when they went to AX last year D;
Thank you so much for mentioning AKB. I'm an IMMENSE fan of them. Lots of people don't know them here at Fanime, so having them come would be something new. Yea sure, they aren't related to anime, but I'm telling you... they are so incredibly popular/famous in Japan I didn't think it'd be possible. Selling over 1 million copies of their 23rd single "Flying Get" is pretty impressive if you ask me. And yet, barely anybody knows them at all here in America. Last year I suggested AKB48 to come to Fanime and I got some negative responses. I don't know what's the problem with them coming over. I mean they came to Anime Expo, there was no problem. If you got any objections, HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST SHOT. (sorry for this long explanation/vent xD)
Is this a challenge? Okay, sure, besides the main group having so many members, if we were to have them as a guest. That would be roughly... 50 people we would be paying for. 50 plane tickets from Japan and back, + hotel rooms to accomadate all of them. The reason why they came to the other places, were that they paid for themselves. So, here's the thing, you're looking at roughly..80k to bring AKB48 here including managers, etc. Now... that 80k could be used to bring... 3 even 4 musical guests out here. Or 2 musical guests, a director, an artist, and a voice actor even.
It's not that they're unknown... AKB48 is known. It's more or less, do people like tem. AKB48 is popular in Japan, they are... but they're not mainstream. They're still very niche culture that likes them. It's the same as Hello Project. Yeah, they're popular, no denying. When they were at their peak in the early to mid 2000's They were even more popular. But they're not mainstream pop culture to the same extent that many other groups are. Hell even the K=pop invasion is growing more in popularity than AKB48 is. And if Fanime were to spend that much money? I would much rather see a really popular group... Like Perfume.
And I'm not sure about what you mean "mainstream". I went to Japan in August and I seriously can't describe how popular they are over there. Yea Kpop is very popular in Japan, but surely they aren't more popular than AKB48. Obviously, KPop is way more popular than AKB48 in America, but I already said, it'd be introducing a new famous group to a lot of the Fanime goers.
Why are we talking about popularity anyways? It's not like Yuya Matsushita was very well known here before Fanime 2011. I never heard of him, and, be honest, a lot of people didn't know him as well. Don't get me wrong, Yuya is a cool guy. I loved his performance.