“Why do we post about the stuff that we buy?

There are many aspects of fandom and community (especially ours, IW) that bother me. I don’t understand this one. Many blogs post pictures or text of their recent purchases (GETS) – CDs, DVDs, Photobooks, Magazines, everything.”

Between his original post and Misa’s highlight about it on IW, it’s already gotten a good discussion going amongst our blogosphere.  Everybody has their opinion on the subject, and most seem to be positive. My comrade in Reina and Meetan fandom, CK, pointed out in a comment at TLS that two of the most popular blogs in the IW contingent, Morning Berryz and Hello! Blog, do this on a regular basis, for two reasons: One, to display what the items look like, and two, to keep their blogs active. CK has done this a lot at both of his sites, noting, “I can only do so many ‘think pieces’ and live concert reports. So the natural thing is to report on the items that I have purchased, if for no other reason to give a review.” 

I cannot say I’m not guilty of this, however. The funny thing is, I don’t show off my purchases of J-Pop items all the time, even though I buy a lot of stuff. Most of what I buy is the actual music on CD (and on vinyl if it exists in that format, something I wish would happen with the MoMusu/H!P material – are you listening, JapanFiles?), and since Paul at Hello! Blog in particular does that on the regular, there’s not much of a point of me doing the same thing. 

Recently at YODC, Langdon asked me if I wanted to make a regular feature out of doing something I was doing on occasion over there, showing off bits from my still-growing vinyl collection. Since that feature became regular earlier this year, only two Japanese-related items have been shown off there: a Sayuri Ishikawa best-of LP from 1977 and a copy of AKB48′s first independently released single (something which CK almost openly ogled in his  comment!). The rest of the vinyls that I have shown off there definitely don’t fall within J-pop guidelines. I think the only J-Pop items I’ve ever shown off in any of my blogs before then were a then-newly-acquired Mari Yaguchi MiniMoni plushie over at MotokoAoyama.com V1.0, and a copy of Mika Todd’s post-MiniMoni CD EP and a couple of other MiniMoni stuffies on my LiveJournal.

Does showing off J-items (or even vinyl aquisitions like I do at YODC) mean, as Broomhead suggests, that people are “caught up in material” or looking to fit in with the IW community? I don’t believe so. Again, I think CK nailed it on the head with the reasoning behind such posts. People like these kinds of posts on occasion. The vinyl posts at YODC happened, on-and-off last year and regularly this year, because Langdon and some of the other YODC crew dug them when I did them, and asked me to keep doing them. And, with the exception of two unintentionally missed instances so far this year, I have.

It’s not for me to put “showoff” posts down, firstly because it would be hypocritical of me, and two, it would be absolutely pointless and negative. These posts are done primarily for fun, and without that element, you have nothing – irregardless of what’s in one’s collection.