731 replies to this topic

[chr0nik©]

I was reading an idol related website (machineworks) and I came across a list made by Japanese fans of the 10 biggest mistakes by UFA, which has somehow undermined and damaged the popularity of H!P in Japan.

1. Choose Mitsui Aika at the 8th MM audition.
2. Jun-jun and Lin-lin joining Morning Musume.
3. Rejecting Mano Erina in the H!P Eggs audition.
4. Rejecting Maeda Yuuka in the H!P Eggs audition.
5. Promoting Aichan as Mizuhara Kana in Q.E.D. ~Shoumei Shuuryou~
6. Ignore the Natsuyaki Miyabi kissing scandal ~link~
7. Faking the reason behind Arihara Kanna's graduation.
8. The little explination behind Koizumi Koharu
9. The needless and useless concerts in China, Korea and US.
10. Ignore the Kamei Eri kissing pictures ~link~

Source.

IMO, I think that most of these are true, like number 2 and 9 but I think that they have made bigger mistakes than those ones, such as having Goto Maki graduating and the poor platform given to the soloists and the units that given one single and then disappeared. Also, lets not forget all the scandals in the last 10 years.

I think it's ok for fans to discuss these things as it's one of the many reasons why H!P and MM are not as popular as they ones were.

Discuss.

[Nao-kun]

I agree with some of them, not so much with others.

I don't see why Linlin and Junjun addition was bad, sure there have been problems in the past between Japan and China, but the Japanese should just get over it, seriously Linlin and Junjun where not even born back then, so its silly to blame them for what happened in the past.

Trying to hide scandals, its a bit of a two sided thing, if there was a actual scandal sure the Girl in question violated their contract, since being a idol is just another job and you get fired for violating the contract in any other job as well why should they not get fired as well? but then there is the risk to loose the wrong ones in a scandal, kicking Kanna was no big loss from a commercial point of view, but imagine they would have had to kick Airi instead...


my own list
In no specific order:

1. Lack of promo for the solo releases of former Momuse members
2. Kicking Goto Maki out of Momuse way too early
3. Lack of new members in Momuse, the original 7th gen auditions resulted in noone being added, then they added only Koha, then they only added Aika...
4. Abandoning the concept of shuffles
5. Country Musume was so badly managed I could make a top 10 mistakes list for them alone
6. Changing Momuse from singers that are also idols to idols that also sing, if they wanted to have more idols, just use the eggs instead of messing up Momuse
7. Tsunku, I don't see a reason to get rid of him, but everyone runs out of ideas eventually, let someone else do something once in a while.
8. Killing Melon Kinenbi
9. Outfits, some of the outfits are just plain ugly.
10. Flooding the market with releases, nothing stands out anymore (with a few exceptions) and people simply can't buy all the relesaes anymore, people have to worry about how they will afford food the next day in such horrible economic times, massfirings everywhere and they expect us to buy 10+ singles a month (and thats not even considering the masses of other merch)?
It will take more than it being another release of insert unit of choice to make people buy it these days.

[Zorr]

Some of those strike me as simply being personal preference by whomever made the list. Aside from those, I want to discuss a few:

5. I'm not sure why they said that promoting Ai in Q.E.D was a bad thing? It wasn't negative publicity. It wasn't that popular but at least some people watched it. I don't get why thats a bad thing.

6. I don't get why people would think it was bad for them to ignore the Miyabi scandal. If they had tried to deal with it then things would only have got worse. I never paid much attention to it but I presume that there was too much evidence for UFA to simply deny it. I think they did the best they could. Just ignore it and hope that most of the fans would let it be.

9. Same reason as 5 for me. They weren't negative publicity. Even if only 1 extra fan was gained, thats still 1 more than had they not done the concerts. I don't see the problem, as long as they didn't loose money, which I really doubt they did.

10. Same reason as 6.

[ninety9nights]

#2 and #9

From the way I see it, it looks like the Japanese fans want Morning Musume to stay only in Japan.

It seems that they don't want to "share" Morning Musume with us non-Japanese fans.

#6

I thought that this was already resolved and that Fukuda Saki was the girl in the pictures?

[Chudreav]

From the original post ~ I agree with:

* Junjun and Linlin choice. Bite my elbow, I do not believe it was a good choice, *regardless* of nationality.
* Ignoring the Natsuyaki scandal, if it was indeed her. Everyone should get the same treatment. You make the rules, you're supposed to follow them. Didn't know about the Kamei one, but if it's wasn't a hoax, the same reasoning applies.
* Kanna's untold graduation reasons and the whole way this was "taken care of". You couldn't have handled it worse, dear UFA.

I'll add:

* Michishige. The worst mistake ever.
* The change in MM's style following Mikan a.k.a. "emomusume".
* S/mileage. All the effort promoting them could be put elsewhere.

Personal preference, or not, this is what I think.

[mikari]

personally, i think for the miya scandal, it's too hard to prove that it was ACTUALLY her when there's fukuda saki around. there's a screencap of fukuda saki kissing a guy (in a movie) and seriously she looked like miya. so i think, thats why we shouldn't be acting so sure that it was miya


for 1 and 2, thats just personal preference. and...are 3 and 4 what UFA should've done...and what happened? o_O
5- no promo is ever bad promo
6-look at 1st paragraph
7- the thing about kanna is...you don't know if they faked it. i'd rather hear from kanna's own mouth what happened before jumping to conclusions.
8- didn't tsunku say it was her time to leave and move on?
9- well at least they're well received in those countries. and they're just being selfish. we share OUR artists.
10- didnt noe about this, won't comment then

[chr0nik©]

9- well at least they're well received in those countries. and they're just being selfish. we share OUR artists.

Well, they don't really have to... do they?

[recs]

Interesting topic.

I didn't agree with 5, 6, 8, 9, 10.

Personal comments about some that I agree with:

1. Yeah, I didn't/don't/may never will see anything 'special' about her. So-so voice, not cute enough, etc...
2. I also agree with this one, more or less like the above reason.
3. Couldn't agree more.
4. same reason as above.
7. This is bad, It just makes them look like they can trash anybody as they like. Why can't they see that she's human and needs to be respected?

about things I didn't agree with:
5. What's so bad about that?
6. Sometimes it's best to just shut up.
8. What more explanation did they need?
9. What useless? AFAIK the concert in U.S. is packed with people, what's so bad about that?
10. same as no.6


IMO some more UFA mistakes:
- A waste of talent. I'm talking about Matsuura Aya, she's talented and with further promotion she still has great future. I don't see why they should 'bench' her already.
- Decrease in vocal talent. They used to have Ayaya, Miki, and Goto as their strongest talent in vocals. Some people state that Takahashi and Lin Lin are the strongest now, but I don't think they can hold a candle compared to the previous 3.
- Tsunku needs to learn to delegate, he needs help in songwriting and producing better artists. I don't remember hearing any memorable songs from Momusu since Miki's out.


As for S/mileage, I think they have potential (mainly in Kanon and Ogawa).

[mikari]

^
^they're doing it anyways tho. like, no one is FORCING them to go to those countries. they chose to go there themselves. they don't have to, but they are anyways. so why stop them if they want to?

[sswishbone]

most of what I thiink has been said, so I shall add some of my own instead: -

1) disbanding the original puccimoni... I mean, released 4 singles and scored 4 number ones, why disband them?

2) letting Koda Kumi slip through their fingers, we can argue all day about her market, she still would have brought masses of sales to the label

3) not adding Kikka to momusu 8th gen... So she sings softly, great, so did Mikitty, it did Momusu no harm when she was in!

[jrongow]

Well, this was after all written by japanese fans, so I can understand 2 and 9, but I'll haf to disagree with them. UFA, as a profit-driven organisation, has to expand overseas, which I have to admit has enjoyed a certain level of success. So while the fans may not like it, I wouldn't label it as a mistake.
Didn't really see who the other contestants were for 8th gen, so can't mention whether picking Aika was a mistake, though honestly I can see where the japanese fans are coming from. Personally I think Aika doesn't really fit in with MM...
3 and 4.. uh.. maybe they wanted to make them solo artistes? Not really sure wat's the situation abt this LOL...
5 is just absolute bullshit... I totally liked Aichan in QED (minus the fact that I'm totally biased for Aichan...), and with the sinking popularity of MM in Japan, I thought it was an understandable move, so I deny it as a mistake!
6, 7, 8 and 10... No comments.
To add my own, one mistake they made was graduating Koharu...

[Himalia™]

1. Choose Mitsui Aika at the 8th MM audition.
2. Jun-jun and Lin-lin joining Morning Musume.
3. Rejecting Mano Erina in the H!P Eggs audition.
4. Rejecting Maeda Yuuka in the H!P Eggs audition.
5. Promoting Aichan as Mizuhara Kana in Q.E.D. ~Shoumei Shuuryou~
6. Ignore the Natsuyaki Miyabi kissing scandal ~link~
7. Faking the reason behind Arihara Kanna's graduation.
8. The little explination behind Koizumi Koharu
9. The needless and useless concerts in China, Korea and US.
10. Ignore the Kamei Eri kissing pictures ~link~


I think it's ok for fans to discuss these things as it's one of the many reasons why H!P and MM are not as popular as they ones were.

Hmm well lets talk about these 10 first.

1 I don't think that was such a terrible thing. Far worse has clearly happened.
2 It was daring and quite surprising to say the least but again clearly not the worse thing that has ever happened.
3 & 4 Again not disasters its still worked out for them.
5 Yes i do agree with this one but is it really so terrible to make the tope 10 ?
6 & 10 OMG girl has boyfriend sensation ! SO WHAT ! Well ok it does upset some of their perhaps to loyal fans and they are well aware of this when they join we might not like it but that is part of the package.
7 In principle i agree but is this really one of the 10 worse things to have happened ?
8 It would be nice to have more details it does make you wonder especially when she was one of there major money spinners. However i dont think this can even come close to being one of the 10 worse things that has happened.
9 Well i dont see an issue with these. They were an attempt to look at other markets did not work as well as they perhaps hoped but it was an attempt so should not be seen as a bad thing fundamentally.

Myself in no specfic order.

1 To many graduations. This alone can take up half the top ten.


The ones that really took there toll IMO were as follows. Yuko Nakazawa, Goto Maki, Kei Yasuda, Natsume Abe, Kaori Iida and Hitomi Yoshizawa.

I would like to say Konkon and Makoto Ogawa but it did not have a huge effect on the group since much of the damage has already been done. Same applies to Rika Ishikawaand Mari Yaguchi. Now Sayaka Ichii i belive is one of the best they have ever had in the history of HP and a lose like her would normally be major but because when it happened (some for Aya and Asukas graduation) it did not have a major impact on the group due to its current fame and strenghth.
Kaori was mentioned because she was the end of 1st gen the group in effect was no longer Morning Musume in its original form. Yossie was mentioned because i feel she was the end of the Golden Era Musumes and it took a major toll on the group as whole. Sales in all fields tell the same story.

2 Yuko Nakazawa was the mother of the groups and cool big sister when needed. Both loving and harsh when needed kept them as a group who worked for the number 1 spot which they deserved. Cared about them more than herself.

3 Goto Maki. What the hell were they thinking of removing the most popular current member. She could of done both and that would of worked well.

4 Kei Yasuda kind of took over the impossible job that Yuko Nakazawa left behind. Although the subleader she often gave the impression that she was really the leader as Kaori never really wanted to be the leader. Although Kei would never win a popularity contest it seems that many did like her and when she graduated it was never going to be the same again as she kept them together as a unit. Like Yuko this graduation hurt the other members alot as well as just the fans. I have heard it said when she graduated by someone who attended that concert that when she left the stage there was an uneasy feeling about their future as everyone suddenly realised what they had just lost.

5 Kaori Iida. Well she was the end of the 1st era. The last leader of Morning Musume now they had little guidence. She battled for her place and deserved it now being a member had almost become a right rather than something you earn.

6 Yossie. Her last song said it all. Kanashimi Twilight even then the sales were not great across the board but now they can only dream of being that good again. Since she went HP have had problems getting on shows. Yes they still do it but not in the numbers they use to unless they use Old School members who people still want to see.

7 The end of Hello Morning. A great show that sold them as a wonderful product and gave so many reason to like them. They changed the format and it failed so they changed it again. Not back to what it use to be just watered it down even further !

8 Dispanding groups that worked or changing the lineup to much Pucchi Moni are the most succesful group other than Morning Musume so they disbanded them ! Tanpopo and Mini Moni got changed and it hurt them badly ! To a lesser degree W and Vuden although W was self inflicetd by Ai Kago.

9 The fan service has changed over the few years i have been a fan. From experience i can say you get far less now than you use to. (in the big picture that is)

10 Management. This is the big one basically someone in charge has no idea at all but due to the way that Japanese buisness works the person in charge cannot be questioned (more often than not) and for him to change his direction would also mean he was admitting to being wrong so this terrible buisness and is more of a problem than any of the actual members itself.

11 Current lineup. Well it is just not of the standard of the older gens. I don't belive a single member of the current lineup would ever of made 1st gen of even been a contender. They became too concerned with idols rather than singers etc.

[Yossi_love]

May I ask what exactly the Koizumi Koharu thing is? Never heard of it before?!

[°Chrisron]

I would like to say Konkon and Makoto Ogawa but it did not have a huge effect on the group since much of the damage has already been done.

11 Current lineup. Well it is just not of the standard of the older gens. I don't belive a single member of the current lineup would ever of made 1st gen of even been a contender. They became too concerned with idols rather than singers etc.

I do pretty much agree with everything on your list so I will not bother making my own. (lazy) The only thing i don't see is the importance of Konkon and Ogawa. I can't see how they are any different from the current lineup. I don't think any of them could have "saved" the current lineup by not graduating. But this is just my personal opinion of course. I'm not saying I'm more right than you or anything.

Oh, and even if I agree that the graduation of Yossie was the end of the golden age, another reason for the lower sales is simply that the songs aren't as good as they used to. They didn't really go for the new (awful) sound they have now until a few singles after Yossie left. But it's pretty interesting that the last really great song ended up being Yossie's last.

[Himalia™]

Hmm. Well i did say "i would like to say Konkon and Makoto"

[Shinyun226]

May I ask what exactly the Koizumi Koharu thing is? Never heard of it before?!

I assume they meant Kusumi Koharu....

[°Chrisron]

@Himalia: That you did, but because of the rest of the sentence I read it as you think it would have made a big impact if the damage weren't already done. Oh well, doesn't really matter. We'll never know the answer to that anyway.

[Himalia™]

O i see. Well if that had been the case it would of been quite a different history for the whole group since it would or rewritten much of the past.

[°Chrisron]

But come to think of it maybe we wouldn't have the new MM sound that I don't like if we still had got all 4 5th gen. members? Or at least better line distribution. Well, seeing how both MM and C-ute are treated they would probably have to stand next to Risa. A few feet behind Aichan. (As you know, I love Aichan , but I still think the line distribution/screentime is unfair)

Maybe Aichan should be given her own little group instead? A Biyuden like group perhaps? Or would that go on someones mistake list as well?

[αλε-сиαη]

5. Promoting Aichan as Mizuhara Kana in Q.E.D. ~Shoumei Shuuryou~
I dont see what's wrong with this... It's beause she was co-starring with a BOY? Or because the drama didnt have success? (and so, if didnt have succes is also a failure for actors...)

I agree with most of the points mentioned in 1st post. Girls scandals really damage their image as idols, but i dont think its the worst.
For me the worst things are graduations, like with Maki, Koharu and the entire members of elder club...
It isnt good also to have the soloist doing nothing at the agency, but thats another mistake.
Our idols image had been damage because of the leaving of the most popular idols( yeah, think about it, i think it hurts, but its true...) and lack of promoting them.