How Intimacy Is Priced

Niunai is an active coser and dancer on Bilibili She shows up at various Only exhibitions, does signings and fan interactions I won’t write about her history, nor am I curious

After being exposed for having a boyfriend, her fans exploded Burning merchandise, doxxing, harassment texts, the full package The announcements are all deleted now, details unverifiable But the outline is clear enough A creator who works for herself, treated as a betrayer by her consumers for falling in love

I only thought back after this incident

Why are these people so mad Just an up主 having a boyfriend Oh, she’s doing idol business, idol business, eating their money No, the money was given voluntarily Then why are fans so angry Oh there’s also economic activity, the signings at various small exhibitions

[Encyclopedia] (Easy) Success Photo session At domestic ACG offline events, you can spend one or two hundred yuan For thirty seconds of physical close contact Plus a Polaroid with your name handwritten by her

Two things make this act more than just consumption

First is market pricing, different people have different prices, not set arbitrarily by herself but by the market’s valuation of her popularity This means there’s a public quote for how much this person is worth

Second is depth of contact, with the same person, photo session is one price, special bonus is another price, more private interactions go even higher What you buy with higher prices isn’t more time or better things, but a stronger feeling of only I can get this close to you

These two things combined, this structure itself implies a relationship rather than a transaction

Dancer plus coser plus Only exhibition performer, these three identities combined create a very special existence in China’s ACG circle She’s not an idol, but she’s using idol methods to do business

This isn’t contradiction, it’s the result of economic logic driving it Dancing and cosplay themselves are hard to monetize, but the person herself can become a commodity Fans are willing to pay for contact with the person So photo sessions and Only exhibition logic naturally grafted over

The problem is, creators think they’re selling photos, fans think they’re cultivating a relationship These two things were never the same thing from day one The photo session itself creates false intimacy, fans paid money, got physical close contact The brain interprets this as relationship rather than consumption This is a structural problem, not Niunai’s personal fault

Japanese idol industry is an interesting reference point That system works not because fans have high quality, but because there are contracts behind it Companies sign love-ban clauses, companies bear legal risks Fans know the rules before entering

The domestic system took the most valuable part, pricing intimacy directly Then threw everything else away No company, no contract, no one backing anything up

The二次偶像 subculture audience is fucked

Reading these people’s statements, I feel my language module broke Let me give some examples

“xx’s behavior really disqualifies her, as a地下偶像 she should have地下偶像 awareness, why do business if not”

“I just think fans also have feelings, spent so much money for this result, who wouldn’t be disappointed”

“Not saying this incident, the circle has its own rules, those who don’t understand rules will eventually be清算”

“Honestly I don’t want to deal with these bang dogs, talk two sentences and you know they have no experience, always think they understand the circle”

“People criticizing her are true fans, those who don’t care are truly indifferent to her life or death”

“I spent how much money and energy on her, yet she doesn’t even give an explanation, what is this, is this respecting fans”

Feel it, very strange, these people are serious when speaking Not performance, not memes, truly serious

They know how absurd this is, but they need it

Real life doesn’t have these, no camps, no trials, no feeling of standing on the right side They consciously choose to consume a real person to provide themselves with a sense of existence

This isn’t a disease unique to this circle The photo session system works not just because creators found a monetization method But also because there’s real demand waiting on the fan side Relationships in real life are vague, unstable, unscripted But here, rules are clear, you pay, you get exclusivity, you belong to a specific camp, your emotional investment has a clear object

This clarity is scarce

So they weren’t deceived They know what this is, but they need the structure it provides When this structure breaks, like when the idol falls in love, their anger isn’t at being deceived But at that sense of structure suddenly disappearing They want to regain control The method is trial, taking sides, making things have right and wrong again

Creator side has no protection mechanism Fan side has unacknowledged emotional needs Two things collide, the result is already there

The conditions for the next incident are already in place now Just not yet the time