Just looking...crazy!

Japanese companies are always looking to meet the needs of the "niche-ist" of niche markets. For example, top-selling record label Avex has discovered a new way to reach extremely anti-social sets — the NEET (Not in Education, Employment, or Training), and the most reclusive of the recluses, the hikikomori. Most believe that these groups’ refusal of social participation stems from their lack of social skills. The hikikomori almost never socialize with other people and prefer to spend their time in their bedrooms, completely locked away from the world. The total numbers of NEET and hikikomori may have been overestimated in the past, but they do exist to some extent and are mostly male.

Avex is trying to reach these groups with a new DVD — part "corporate social responsibility," part traditional content delivery, and part talent blog/model promotion. The DVD is called Miteiru dake (Just Looking), and it features various talent/models just staring straight ahead. That’s right, the models on the DVD do very little other than stare straight at the camera. According to the website, the idea is to get young males who aren’t used to socializing with women to become more accustomed to making eye contact and/or handle the fact that a sentient being sits across from them and awaits interaction. The DVD hopes to cure those afflicted with shyness so that they may rejoin society.





The result, from what one can see on the website, is strangely disconcerting. A girl will stare back at you for an extended period of time, expressionless and periodically blinking (the blinks are eerily profound). Once in a while the model will utter a phrase like "ohayoo" (good morning) or make a move to say something, but for the most part there is just an uncomfortable silence. Most of the women on the DVD are jimusho-based talento (most have blogs on Ameba and other DVDs of their own to sell), but there are also foreign women, young girls, and older women thrown in the mix to give the viewer experience in handling long, uncomfortable silences with those of different races and ages.

Without even broaching the logic of creating a product expressly for a niche that doesn’t have a whole lot of money, Miteiru Dake is a bold new experiment in combination idol promotion and social charity, using a conventional Japanese content business model (nothing’s free, but you can buy it on DVD and follow up with the stars through their blogs). And one of the payoffs is that the reformed NEET and hikikomori may just become lifelong fans of the female idols who saved them from the hells of an asocial existence.

read in http://clast.diamondagency.jp/en/