Talk:Japanese idol

message: I came to this page because I was watching a movie featuring a japanese idol group, and i didn't really understand what that was. 
after reading this page I got the impression they are manufactured pop acts a la Britney Spears, but then I clicked on Beppin mag and that is some sort of mens mag/Playboy/naked centerfold thing? I think this article may need some clarification as to how much of this scene is for teens and how much of it is a sex industry thing aimed at adults, as this seems to me to be an important distinction between the japanese idol scene and the manufactured pop scene in the west.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.237.74.73 (talk) 08:10, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: confused

message: What happens to the ones that go out of favor with the public?
: Well they just return to anonimity and a normal social life, get a job, get married, etc... A few of them try to catch on their brief celebrity for a few months more by appearing as "guests" in TV programs, or even by selling "nude phoobooks" of them, a not-so-rare surprising move for these "innocent girls".  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.80.251.221 (talk) 08:51, 7 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Were are they now?

message: I think this is an interesting article, but it also contains a huge flaw in that it gives the mistaken impression that idols are exclusively female. This is quite clearly false - the role of male idols such as SMAP, V6 and Shonentai is almost (if not equally) as important as those of their female counterparts in Japanese pop culture. Surely they need to be mentioned?
:Whoops, forgot to sign  Poltergeist 09:54, 18 Feb 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I wrote "mostly female", I hope this is OK with you. Maikel (talk) 19:17, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: marker mostly for myself to come back and edit this:  that's not really good enough, because there isn't even a single mention of males otherwise, and the article still gives the impression that idols are exclusively female.  which isn't even remotely true.  johnny & associates, the most powerful idol machine in japanese entertainment, only handles boys. there are a lot of male idols, and some make it just as big as some female ones -- just looking at the oricon charts bears that out.  there is also no mention here of the companies that crank out these manufactured celebrities; should have at least links to those, because without them there would be no idols. piranha]] [[User talk:Piranha|(notify) (talk) 21:14, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Male

message: "Good examples of this are Ayumi Hamasaki, Noriko Sakai, Ryoko Hirosue and Namie Amuro."
This sentence is vague; what is "this" referring to?
Also, I suggest alphabetizing the list of idols at the end, unless there is some reason why it isn't already (which is why I haven't done it).
Commander Nemet 20:31, 27 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: This

message: I think she's more of a performance artist... But aside from that, if the definition of "idol" here is appearance-oriented, I would contend that Utada is NOT an "idol", as she is not marketed by her looks. --OneTopJob6 20:13, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  [[Utada Hikaru]] an idol? 

message: Seems too long and (as noted above) a bit vauge.  I'd like to see it cut down to perhaps five. - brenneman{T}{L}  06:06, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  The list of idols 

message: Possibly the two main artists who come to my mind when I think of AIDORU are Rie Miyazawa and Aya Ueto. I'm suprised that they are not mentioned at all.
And this was mainly prominent in the 1980s, where there was a big movement of idols who were popular, but I see mostly not-so-popular recent artists mentioned.
Also, from what I can see, the list is extremely unorganized and frankly too long. I think just the biggest idols should be listed. I wish I knew more about the subject on a larger scale because personally I think this page does need to be cleaned up a lot. Mizerunmei 14:58, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Leaving out main idols 

message: Her album SWEET 19 BLUES was never the best selling album of Japan with 3 million copies. globe with their first album sold 4 million copies only in Japan in 1996, so that's impossible, and only Utada 's album outsold it later. Clouded 22:04, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Namie Amuro

message: If you read the Japanese version of this same article there are many important differences. In fact, the english version is poorly accurate about idol definition. For example, Namie Amuro wasn't an idol, but a "post-idol artist" (ISBN:0-674-01773-0) and Utada Hikaru is a Top Artist/composer but not an Idol. Even in Japan the common people can understand about these differences, since they call "aidoru" to just some kind of artists, for example, these with "buri-buri iso" costumes, “purehearted and pretty,” sweet, childlike, humble, and honest people. Same girls or boys, Idols MUST BE into this classification. All other artists are "Celebrities" or "Top Artist" or "Singers", or "Tarento" or anything else.  I propose to search Verificable Sources (books, magazine articles, JAPANESE VERSION of this same article, etc) for improve or to accurate the content. --Cbpm 03:23, 24 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I see, it's similar to "Boy Band", in that not every group involving multiple male performers is a "Boy Band", it's a specific type of group? (For example, the group Slipknot is made up of male performers, and is a band, but not a "Boy band", whereas Backstreet Boys is). Kuronue 04:39, 19 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Slipknot were in their twenties when they started out, so they wouldn't be called a boy band for that reason alone.  Maikel (talk) 19:28, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Verificable content? 

message: In my mind Japanese idols owe their career to being heavily "produced and promoted" by agencies and the media industry, rather than owing their success to personal talent and ambition, and therefore this should be included in the introduction.  I won't put it in there personally as I'm not really competent in this matter.  What do you think?  Maikel (talk) 19:16, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Produced

message: I just read "For a fuller understanding of both role play and the idealisation of youth in Japanese media and culture it is worth reading articles by Dr Sharon Kinsella, referenced below" could someone tell me why Wikipedia is telling people to read a book instead of going into detail about something.86.161.70.226 (talk) 23:00, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wait What? 

message: The article needs to be rewritten. The lead section is unclear to those without prior knowledge.
Since the article is largely unsourced anyway and it can't be made any worse (IMO), the solution for me would be to randomly rewrite it (randomly at random times).
Here a citation from myself. Someone asked what the article (in some other language) was about exactly. I can add random stuff like this:
Another citation from myself.The question was about the definition. "Who decides they are cute? The fans or the employer?"
Anyway, you see, no one understands. Something must be done.
I propose (since the article is largely unsourced anyway) to write what we have to write. To write a better definition and add many other stuff so that the readers could actually understand what the article was about. And we can find sources later. --Moscow Connection (talk) 10:51, 24 April 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  A better definition and a rewrite 

message: I have finally rewritten the lead. I must say that the more I edit it, the harder it is going to be to source it. I started with (almost) everything easily sourceable, but since have added much more. I basically have no other choice but to do it like that cause the topic is rather complicated.
I hope no one objects, cause there are basically two choices: 1. to return to equally unsourced previous version that was terrible, too; 2. to leave a version by someone who have been thoroughly thinking about it for, like, two years and after several years of being horrified by this article finally decided to rewrite it a little bit. :)
Since if I don't want to source it now and I would prefer to leave it like that for some time (cause the absence of references makes it easier to read and change), I will now post a few excepts from reliable sources that can prove that what I added is sourceable.
Here it is. I will post more here. Cause when I was writing I was thinking "I've heard this, I remember I've read this somewhere", so there is much more I can find sources for.
--Moscow Connection (talk) 05:11, 11 June 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rewriting has started 

message: , , ,  Can we close the discussion about ages now at least? My opinion is as follows: "young" — ok, "manufactured" — ok (net celebrities don't count, they along with gravure idols, which is more or less simply another word for "model", and other "something idols" can be discussed in a separate section), "cute" — add that they are not only cute, but since 1990s also cool, hip, whatever. It should be understood from the definition that cuteness in the main or common characteristic, but that idols have become cooler or whatever. In short, the first two thirds of the definition stay as they are now, the part after comma (about cuteness) is expanded.
And I have an idea of a quick fix. (I'm just afraid that it is not usually done on Wikipedia.) We can create a section titled "Definition of the term idol" or something like this and put there five or so definitions or opinions about who idols are. Just choose from the ones that are already cited on this talk page. --Moscow Connection (talk) 21:14, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Moscow Connection - So long as all parties that are involved in the dispute agree to close this, then it's perfectly fine by me. I am concerned that you two may not have your disputes worked out nor do you have the full definition of "idol" taking into account all viewpoints, but the important key here is consensus and dispute resolution. So long as those are met, then we've achieved our first priority. We can always come back and add more to the article later. ~Oshwah~(talk) (contribs)  22:28, 1 June 2016 (UTC)
replies: text:  Moscow Connection, I just read in one of the noticeboard threads that you're accepting my "a term typically used to refer to" suggestion. That actually helps a lot. If we add that to the first sentence, I don't think we'd need any other definitions or additions at all and could keep the rest of the lead as it is. So "In Japanese pop culture, "idol" [...] is a term typically used to refer to young manufactured stars/starlets marketed to be admired for their cuteness" it is? Can I implement it like this? (I dropped the "usually" before "cuteness" because the "typically" already takes care of exceptions.) MugiMafin (talk) 14:49, 2 June 2016 (UTC)

text:  Moscow Connection seems to have vanished, but we have his word here . MugiMafin (talk) 20:28, 5 July 2016 (UTC)
thread_title: Arbitrary break 1

message: To stop the silly disruptive reverting, I have protected this page to prevent editing by anyone other than an admin. Please come to a consensus about the definition and whatever else you're discussing in the above TL;DR wall of text, and then ask for the change to be made using . Thank you. ···日本穣 · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe · Join WP Japan! 21:51, 27 April 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Page protected 

message: The sections "History" and "Culture" have a pretty big overlap, which is why I'd like to merge them into one. The content of the "Modern idols" section is historical too, so that could go into the merger too. Same with "Net idols". The new merged section would have subsections though of course.
"Virtual idols" and "Photo idols" could go in one separate section like "Other types of idols". Actually, "Photo idols" can be removed completely since it's already covered by the link to the article "Gravure idol" in the "See also" section.
Any thoughts about or objections to any of this? MugiMafin (talk) 11:32, 21 May 2016 (UTC)
replies: text:  Alright, got it. I'm not sure if the "to over 40" part can be considered original research though, since the members' birthdates are already listed in the members' respective articles. I guess I can put a link to one member's official profile though, just to play it safe. As for the lead section, it seems more or less acceptable to me now that it's followed up by the ambiguity section, so I don't see much of a reason to change it for now. But if I come across some newer more reliable source dealing with stuff from the lead section that contradicts the current version in some way, I might consider changing it. I'm not really actively looking for any sources like that though, so it's probably not going to happen. MugiMafin (talk) 18:08, 23 May 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Combining sections 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: As a whole the article is well written, focused and unbiased. As noted in the article, sections of it need citation or examples for relevant information. Several of the citations were checked, but did not lead to the actual referenced portion of the source. Reference number 8 for example leads to an Amazon page for the referenced book, and the following references lead to the Google books page with the books in English, but the Google Books page being in Russian. None of the references checked had links to the permission to share the information as noted in the training. A few of the other references such as for the Asahi Shinbun were locked behind a paywall, and not able to be freely accessed. Overall the article citations need work.
The talk page for the article is mostly inactive though it does appear that there has been an effort to rewrite, and improve the article. Some of the references listed on the talk page, however are some of the same ones that have issues as mentioned above. There does seem to be disagreements between the writers, and editors of the article about correct wording, and sourcing for it.
The article is part of the groups as start class, high priority for Japan/Culture, and mid priority Women's History, and Sexuality Discussion of this topic seems mainly limited to what makes an idol, and idol, and who is actually an idol.
My question for the article is this, is there any current work or research being done on the article, and if so who is doing it?EdogawaConan2 (talk) 00:30, 3 February 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article Evaluation 02, Feb, 2018 

message: The group Momoiro Clover Z is blatantly promoted (WP:PROMOTION) on the article also raising WP:BALANCE issue. All other groups, as is practice in every music article, notability is established on commercial success and that means chart success and selling music records. That's why AKB48, Morning Musume and Babymetal are mentioned in the lead, although instead of Babymetal should be Arashi due to commercial success in the 2010s, however, in comparison to the most notable music act who are selling millions of records and getting certifications, MCZ according to Momoiro Clover Z discography most of the time their singles barely sell 50,000 copes while albums barely sell over 100,000 copies (lowest Gold certification by RIAJ). Their notability is claimed on the basis of journal surveys between 2013-2017 in which "has been ranked as the most popular female Japanese idol group", which again is not made by authoritative Oricon, in which notable poll of 20,000 for "Favorite Artist Ranking" they are not even featured in Top 50 and Top 20 acts for example between 2015-2017 (, , ), while others are. Hence, placing them in the lead, and as the first image (!), is nothing else but an attempt to promote them on Wikipedia without any reliable WP:WEIGHT credibility. Hence I removed their mention from lead and edited other ().--78.2.109.23 (talk) 12:17, 23 November 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: What kind of balance when there's no WP:BALANCE in the order of the images (you are constantly giving higher weight to The Nikkei surveys, while removing and ignoring Oricon surveys, recorded sales, certifications by RIAJ and other), their placement in the sections, there's serious lack of body text and many more? You are constantly lying about the article's content and the issue at question.--78.1.87.210 (talk) 12:42, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: Where are these "Oricon surveys, recorded sales, certifications by RIAJ"? I don't see anything like this in this article.You are welcome to add some info about some Oricon surveys and an extensive reliably-sourced third-party analysis of AKB48's "recorded sales, certifications by RIAJ" as compared to other idol groups. Please do that. That would definitely make this article better. But you have just been repeatedly removing the photo, that's all you do here in this article. --Moscow Connection (talk) 12:55, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: Where are these "Oricon surveys... I don't see anything like this in this article"? You removed them (). How you even dare to ask such a question? "You are welcome to add some info about some Oricon surveys", but I already did and you removed it. How dare you to say "repeatedly removing the photo... that's all you do here in this article" when I added Oricon surveys?--78.1.87.210 (talk) 13:03, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
replies: text:  Okay, okay. I didn't notice you (finally) added some prose. All the edits you made in the last few days were marked as reverts, so I assumed it was the same edit you made earlier (this one). I've just put the sentence back. --Moscow Connection (talk) 14:16, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

text:  Actually, I think the wording of your addition is unsuitable for this article, cause it questions the group's success instead of calmly discussing the overall results of the poll. I think you should instead mention AKB48 and other groups that placed higher in the poll.I hope you will rewrite your addition. And the article can be expanded with a thorough analysis of the Japanese idol scene (if you can find a source like that). --14:28, 26 November 2018 (UTC)

text:  I've looked of the sources. What are you talking about? AKB48, too, isn't present on the list every time and, when it is present, it is ranked rather low. I think you addition is confusing, I will rewrite it. --Moscow Connection (talk) 14:46, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
replies: text:  Please stop acting around you didn't notice, you're simply incompetent to be a Wikipedia editor. Stop placing the MCZ image in the top of the LEAD when there's no overall rationale for doing that, or change the order with proper attribution to The Nikkei, or it cannot be included there. The survey was not done by Oricon and hence basing the popularity on and only on The Nikkei is fraudlent.--31.217.24.109 (talk) 15:14, 26 November 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Momoiro Clover Z 

message: There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Korean idol which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you.  —RMCD bot 04:47, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Move discussion in progress 

message: I think you are doing a good job. so I won't interfere, but I'm concerned about you removing the selective list of active idols and some links to particular groups.
I've also noticed that while you removed all mention of particular Morning Musume's sister groups with a rather harsh and dismissive edit summary ("Removed some WP:UNDUE weight on information about certain groups, since this article is supposed to be about idols in general") (and that was despite S/mileage being prominently mentioned in the CYZO article used as the source), you've added links to the articles you've worked on or created, such as "Koharu Kusumi", "Stabbing of Mayu Tomita", and "NGT48" (§ "December 2018 Maho Yamaguchi assault"). And again, you decided to mention the Mayu Tomita and Maho Yamaguchi incidents, but didn't mention the saw attack on AKB48 members that was the third attack mentioned in the source. --Moscow Connection (talk) 01:46, 9 February 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Also, throwing in the list of "notable idol agencies" will likely welcome edits for WP:PROMOTION and there's already List of Japanese idols to cover that. There are hundreds of idol groups these days and it's not necessary to add every single one. If you do want to re-add information such as what you mentioned about S/mileage, feel free to do so, but you may need to revise your wording so it doesn't take away from the general topic of idols. The writing should put more focus on the main topic, not the example. For example, I removed the tidbit about Idoling!!! having their own television show since the way the sentence was presented was too promotional, but if you're able to tie it back to the main idea of the paragraph then it's okay to re-add. lullabying (talk) 04:42, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

text: * Okay, okay. You've added the groups back, so I'm done here and (as I've said) I won't interfere with your work. (Cute was definitely one of the major figures of the Idol Warring Period.)I think you "cherry-picked" Kusumi Koharu cause you typed in her name in the news search. :-) Cause the Oricon article is from 2008 when she was indeed very prominent, but since then there have been some AKB48 projects that can be mentioned too.But okay... I will look at the article in a few months, when you are done with it. Don't delete the pictures. :-)Btw, I'm suprised there are so many sources in English. There weren't almost any back when I worked on this article.  --Moscow Connection (talk) 05:38, 9 February 2019 (UTC)

text: I'm almost done copy-editing but I do have concerns with some of the other sections. Most of the "idol image" sections are worded in a way that comes off as WP:ORIGINAL and there are no sources to back them up. I may expand "Media" to introduce how prolific the idol trope is in fictional works (which is also tied to anime, manga, and other otaku hobbies). Last, but I am considering merging Wotagei to the fan culture section, as the article itself is a stub with unreliable resources and original research. Information about wotagei can be summed up in one or two paragraphs. lullabying (talk) 23:53, 14 February 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Recent rework 

message: I think once the original research concerns are addressed (which is basically information on how idols were viewed in each time period), it might be a good idea to nominate this as a good article. lullabying (talk) 03:13, 22 March 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Nominating for good article status 

message: Why is this in the Anime and manga wikiproject Qwv (talk) 10:39, 10 July 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: There's a section on this page discussing how Japanese idols are common in anime and manga, and that lots of anime and manga these days are built around idols to sell anime song CDs. lullabying (talk) 01:31, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

text: Also, idol voice actors are included as a sub-market too. lullabying (talk) 01:32, 20 August 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikiproject