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Wii Puts Japanese Television Under Pressure
Knuckles writes "The Times reports that Japanese consumers have been 'abandoning television' in order to play with Nintendo's Wii. Recent figures from Japan's audience-tracking firms show that 'last week was the first in nearly two decades where no single show on any commercial station attracted more than a 9 per cent audience share ... According to one senior executive of the country's largest commercial television channel, Fuji TV, families who used to tune in to its colourful diet of soap operas, panel games and comedy variety shows may, instead, be drifting away and choosing to spend the same, economically-critical golden hour time playing on their Wii.'"
It's funny to think that television is finally being replaced (or at the very least, threatened) by a medium that actually supports the end of the couch potato. Irony? Just a bit.
it's worth it.
The Times reports that Japanese consumers have been 'abandoning television' in order to play with Nintendo's Wii
Secret reliable sources say that Nintendo will start to sell TV sets as well...
It's so perfect, it could have been written by Nintendo.
But television is destined to become as irrelevant and ignored as commercial local radio stations. Maybe one day we'll get to reclaim the bandwidth that it wastes, and use it for something more worthwhile.
I left TV for videogames, the web, chat, forums, downloadable music and anime episodes long time ago.
You think Hard Gay is "repressed"?
2) Bad news. Japanese watching less TV => likelihood of fewer cool anime shows being made => bad for me as otaku
Actually... I'm with Japan on this. Wii > Anime. But it's a damn tough trade-off to make!
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
At first, I tought that japanese television were under pressure with all those flying wiimotes. Imagine all the stress the TVs must have when someone starts to play the wii, they never know if they're gonna make it or not.
I didn't found something funny to put here.
lol
Think about it. Wii NEEDS TV. Quite impossible to play one without a TV. Not to mention, their primary advertising is to young people on TV.
If sharing a song makes you a pirate, what do I have to share to be a ninja?
You think Hard Gay is "repressed"?
Gay "black face". I'd say thats pretty repressed. Make a characature of a gay person done by a straight person. I'm sure it'd be pretty offensive if we did that here or subsituted gay with spanish or chinese.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
What exactly is a "Wii Puts"?
....lets face it it's not like the Wii was facing any real quality opposition. (and as for the argument of "so bad it's good" even that wears a bit thin after a few weeks)
Anyone can suggest a place in Toronto that has them in stock?
Eric McCormack (Will from Will and Grace) is straight. You were saying?
Chernobyl 'not a wildlife haven' - BBC News
Maybe they're just using the web browser on the wii to watch tv from youtube and other places -
imeem is probably the most complete of the wiiptimised sites I've seen, since imeem does music and video it covers the basic stuff you'd want to see from a media center. You can't access the blogs, photos, chat or social features from teh wii but you can pretty much get all the music, and I guess they've just signed a deal with warner brothers so there should be more than indie stuff up there.
I've just spent some time searching the Japanese language internet, and I cannot find a decent source for this - all the blogs seem to be quoting British sources for this. Has anyone got any hard facts?
Do you find this comment more disturbing:
A) In context?
B) Out of context?
C) Help! Help! I'm being repressed!
D) Cowboy Neil?
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
I wouldn't bother if I lived in the USA since watching their TV programs is a waste of time, but I happen to be quite fond of Japanese TV.
You can just turn on the TV and there's almost always something interesting, funny or nice. But life in Japan is very busy and time is very limited. It's a tough tradeoff.
Bloody peasant!
Eric McCormack (Will from Will and Grace) is straight. You were saying?
And the US is a paragon of acceptance and liberal attitudes. In fact your president rode in on a platform partially about gay marriage. I didn't read it but it must have been progressive and positive.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
Am I the only one that thinks that ~3M Wiis sold in a country with 127M people is not going to be noticable in terms of television viewing?
As much as I love my Wii, I find it very hard to believe that there's enough of them out there to really make a noticable difference.
BTW, isn't no program getting over 9% almost impossible anyway, as the percentage is based on the total number of viewers at that time on all channels, so with 6 or so private and 2 public channels, cable and satellite have to have pretty high shares to depress all the terrestrial broadcasts.
Also, I found it amusingly predictable how it didn't take long for someone to blame Soka Gakkai for it all.
A lot of you really do not know what Japanese TV really means. My wife is Japanese, and I lived there several years while going to animation school. I spent many a' day doing my home work while trying to find something to watch on TV (I was doing contract programming from home/bar). Let me tell you this...there is NOTHING of interest on TV before 7 or 8 at night. NOTHING! Don't make me repeat that. Oh wait...at around 2:00 there are old Samurai movies that have some nudity in them....
He's straight, and his job is pretending to be gay. And not just "Well, when I'm in the privacy of my own bedroom..." gay, more "I own no clothes except form-fitting black leather and dry hump everything that moves and much that does not" gay. You'd feel repressed, too!
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
Average family size is just over 3, so thats 42 million households. 9% drop of viewership is like losing 3.78 million households. I can't imagine that ALL of the Wiis picked off a household, but I could imagine that the intersection of "plays Wii" and "watches television" is pretty darn high. Thus, there are probably a few million households with older folks, young single salarymen, etc who do not watch television at all, reducing the total number of TV viewing households, and then 3 millon Wiis could cause a bit of a bite.
Now, most likely, there is a witches brew of factors here, of which the Wii is only one part. Frankly, I think the Wii is probably not causing a 9% decline or even a 5% decline based on my totally anecdotal knowledge of my Japanese friends and coworkers. That said, add in 3% from a Wii with 3% from random variation and 3% from a poor season for TV and things go from "disappointing" to "crisis" in a hurry.
Help poke pirates in the eyepatch, arr.
Considering how many new "reality TV" shows we get every year in the US, I doubt they are anywhere near the limit yet. For example, "Surviver" is up to what, about version 30 by now?
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
Good time to take a shower
-Darkshadow (There was a thing called Heaven; but all the same they used to drink enormous quantities of alcohol.)
For some reason, this doesn't surprise me. Consumers are probably better off anyway.
I don't really see the problem. Most of the straight people on tv are also caricatures and not very realistic. That's just the way television is, if you want realism turn off the tube.
TV shouldn't worry! Any day now, Sony PS3 domination begins and the Wii fad will end.
There, is that enough repetitions to make it true already?
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
There should be a "Wii TV" Channel on the Wii that is like an alarm clock that tells you that there's your favourite show on TV.
Happy lucky!
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
Except for three good TV series in the past couple years (Arrested Development, 24, 30 Rock), I don't watch TV, I play EQ or pursue other hobbies ...
Compared to Japan most Lynch Mobs are paragons of acceptance and liberal attitudes.
Do some research before flaming please.
In a country with almost no laws on discrimination over age, sex, nationality, sexual orientation, education, voting history, or musical tastes a positive character, stereotype or not, is a big step (yes even if he is a Pro Wrestler / Comedian).
What's anime have to do with the topic at hand? Anime isn't shown during prime-time hours on TV. Anime in Japan falls into two categories:
1) Kiddie stuff shown in the after-school time slot.
2) Otaku-oriented stuff shown at night on premium channels like WOWOW and direct-to-video stuff.
The stuff they're talking about is all live action: soap operas, comedy shows, game shows, etc., and Japanese live-action television takes Sturgeon's Law to 11.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
this just gave me the perfect idea for a Wii game. It's based on the only japanese TV show with which I am familiar. Maximum Exposure! You control giddy young japanese people as they stumble through dangerous waste-filled obstacle courses built in abandoned industrial parks. Come to think of it, if most japanese television is anything as ridiculous (and amusingly hilarious) as that show, then the entire industry has a bright future in Wii games. Ah Max X. Is that show still on anymore?
This is a country where abortion laws are lax, singlehood has increased dramaticaly in the last decade and birth rates are below replacement. This is a country where the LDP(conservatives) only gets 38% of the parliament. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_general_elec tion%2C_2005#Polls_and_results
I used to think about Japan as you do, but I have come to the conclusion that it is closer to Britain than Texas.
Back in the day, the NES was sold in a "Power Set" that included the NES, the Zapper light gun, and a mat. The console came with a triple-game cart featuring Super Mario Bros, Duck Hunt, and World-Class Track Meet. The last game used the mat for its controller.
Nintendo's vision was that you'd play World-Class Track Meet by running/jumping in place on the mat to simulate the necessary running and jumping in events.
People eventually realized they could just cheat by pounding down on the mat with their fists, instead.
I suspect many Wii games, especially Wii Fit will be likewise be "cheated" by using the remote in ways that may go against Nintendo's original vision.
Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, START
The level of pain involved in watching nearly anything live-action that comes on Japanese television cannot be understated. The production values are poor, the actors are utterly talentless, and the content is void of sentience. It's incredibly cringe-worthy to watch. The corniness level of Japanese television can only really be rivaled in American pop culture terms by the TV of the 70s -- especially the game shows, talent shows, comedy shows, and soap operas mentioned in the article.
TV was the worst part of my time in Japan back in 2000.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
Local commercial radio stations are hardly irrelevant. They're the most convenient source of local traffic, weather and information... at least when you're driving. Personally, I still also rely on broadcast radio for music and news. I refuse to pay a satellite radio provider for content I essentially get for free living in a major metropolitan area.
you mean you can do other things in the big square thing instead of playing video-games?