What’s the secret behind Supergirl?

The Shady Overlord Contract

The truth is that the contract has been signed and confiscated for many years

The contract issue must involve Shanghai Tianyu Media Co., Ltd., which holds the Super Girl brand. Entertainment is wholly-owned by Hunan Radio and Television Group and was registered in Shanghai on May 24, 2004. It is responsible for the entire operation of Super Girl and acts as an agent for the development of Super Girl-related products. For Supergirl players, the first time they heard the name Tianyu was when they signed the contract.

Super Girl stipulates that all promoted contestants must sign a contract with Tianyu. Starting from the top 20 in the division, contestants must sign an agreement or contract with Tianyu. The top 10 teams in each division have to sign an eight-year contract with Tianyu. The contract stipulates that if Supergirl breaks the contract and signs with another company privately, she will have to pay a liquidated damages of 5 million yuan. Even if Supergirl privately participates in other performing arts activities under the name Super Girl this year, she will still have to pay a liquidated damages of 500,000 yuan. If she wants to terminate the contract, You must promise to never enter the entertainment industry after the contract is terminated. But few players were informed of this when registering.

What’s even more outrageous is that according to a player who has signed a contract, after a rehearsal, a staff member came up with a contract and asked them to sign it. If they don’t sign, they can’t continue the competition. Most of the players participating in the competition want to I was moving forward, so I had to sign. There was only one contract, and it was taken away after the player signed it. Although Tianyu left after signing the contract, a reporter still got a photocopy of the contract. This text called "Agent Agency Contract" has 6 pages and is divided into 11 clauses. From the perspective of liability for breach of contract, if it was Tianyu that actually breached the contract, Super Girl could also claim compensation of 5 million yuan. But an unnamed "Super Girl" told reporters, "The contract did not promise how much investment we would make, nor did it mention when the record would be released, how many TV series would be filmed, or anything else. It's hard to say they breached the contract."

For many super girls who have not gone to Changsha to participate in the finals, the problems they are facing now are quite embarrassing. Tianyu has no intention of packaging them up yet, and some of these super girls often shoot commercials or films before participating in the competition. Taking over roles, summer vacation is the golden period for their development. However, this contract with Tianyu restricted their development.

Real record of the powerful team being eliminated unexpectedly

Han Zhenzhen from the Hangzhou Division was asked to sign an agreement by Tianyu on the day he entered the top 20 and the day he entered the top 10. However, the top 20 The agreement will automatically expire at the end of this year. "At that time, I estimated that if I entered the top 10, I would have to sign a contract with Tianyu for at least five years. I participated in the competition to seek development. If I signed a contract with Tianyu, how could I develop?" In the end, Han Zhenzhen did not sign the agreement. As a result, she In the 20-to-10 match, he lost to Ji Minjia on PK.

At that time, Han Zhenzhen, who was extremely talented, gained strong support with his song "Leaves", but was eliminated due to one or two "out of tune" songs. In fact, there are countless cases where Supergirl occasionally goes out of tune. Judge Hei Nan's explanation is: "The 'strength' faction is not allowed to go out of tune, but the idol faction is allowed."

Behind-the-scenes benefits

As As a newly established company, Tianyu does not have strong capabilities in packaging, production, and distribution. If each contracted player is packaged, the packaging cost for 50 players will exceed 20 million yuan. It is difficult for Tianyu to come up with so much funds at once. Come on, in fact, the current sluggish domestic pop music scene cannot digest 50 new singers in a year. Why is Tianyu still so nakedly asking so many super girls to sign dominance contracts with him this year?

There is only one reason for this. Among the top three in last year's Super Girl finals, Tianyu made a mistake and did not sign the third place Zhang Hanyun and sold it to Tianzhong Company. As a result, Tianzhong Company made Zhang Hanyun this year. It's booming. At the same time, some music companies send their contracted singers to participate in Super Girl, use this program to gain popularity, and then leave. This made Tianyu firmly believe that he would rather kill a thousand people by mistake than let one person slip through the net.

Supergirl has already formed a star effect through the competition. Through this activity, Tianyu aims to squeeze out all the possible commercial value of Supergirl. In this way, if the contract with Supergirl is not easy to package, it can be sold in the form of a "transfer fee" Give it to other companies; if you can see results, immediately release records and accept performances; for players who do not have distinctive characteristics and are not strong, just ignore them. Anyway, the contract is decided by Tianyu, and they will not suffer any loss no matter what. .

Two acquaintances behind the scenes as judges

The truth is that public judges have no autonomy

The Super Girl finals are now underway, and two of the three judges are actually from Hunan Satellite TV One of the employees was Hei Nan, whom even Chang Kuan said he was unfamiliar with. "I have been in the music industry for 22 years and have never known Hei Nan. I have never heard of the songs he produced or the singers he packaged." Moreover, he claimed before the finals. The decision to rotate the judges also changed temporarily. As for the public judges who decide the outcome of PK, they are not actually able to vote for their favorite players as people imagine.

Recording the staff on stage to vote

A man who was recruited from 20 to 10 in the Hangzhou competition area and served as a public judge for two consecutive games wrote an article online saying that at the scene of 10 to 7 , when Ding Ding and Zhou Yang were leading 9:0 in the PK, someone on the scene directed the public judges to start voting for Zhou Yang. In the PK match between Ye Yiqian and Lin Shuang in the finals, when the votes between the two were similar, a staff member even took the stage to vote in place of the public judges.

In the top three games in the Hangzhou Division, TV viewers discovered that Zheng Jingwen and Lin Shuang had an advertisement for more than 10 minutes before the PK results were announced, and Ji Minjia’s text message approval rate was also short. From last to first in two hours. This also triggered many people's associations and questions. What happened in the finals?

Benefits behind the scenes

What kind of singers are selected to enter the next round is related to whether the TV ratings can be maintained. Therefore, it is necessary for the TV station to eliminate those who are not popular and disobedient. The thing to consider is what kind of players will be most beneficial to the ratings if they advance to the next round, and they will choose what kind of players. To achieve this goal, it is easy to pass the judges and public judges. Even the text message votes are questioned in the sub-competition areas where there is not much attention.

Three fatigue schedules behind the scenes

The truth lengthens the schedule and increases the competition time

Super Girl has brought not only brand improvement to Hunan Satellite TV, but also richness of wealth. Currently, Hunan Satellite TV's advertising price for Super Girl every Friday has exceeded CCTV's prime time advertising price. In order to make money, Hunan Satellite TV no longer considers the audience's desire for results to come out early. The Super Girl competition lasted for more than 3 hours. In fact, some links were completely designed to extend the time. From the elimination of one contestant at the beginning of the competition to the elimination of the next contestant, the time was as long as 2 hours, and this After a period of time, it is nothing more than the singer singing again and the judges re-evaluating it.

Case 5 Finals Weared Out Super Girl

In the finals, there were only 15 people left, but the game dragged on for a long time. First, the 2nd and 3rd places in the 5 divisions were let ***10 people came to play two 10-in-7 and 7-in-5 games, and then these 5 people played 10-in-8, 8-in-6, 6-in-5, 5-in-3 and championship games against the champions of the five divisions. In 5 games, the number of games in the division has doubled. What the organizers consider is not whether Supergirl can bear it physically and mentally, but to increase millions in advertising revenue and text message revenue.

Benefits behind the scenes

The longer the time, the more advertising time will be, and the crazier the audience will be by SMS voting. Increasing the length and frequency of programs means increasing bundles of money.

Behind the scenes: 4 younger contestants

The truth: A large number of students skipped classes to participate

The younger contestants of "Super Girl" are an important focus that attracts attention. Last year, Zhang Hanyun, who was only 15 years old, became famous overnight and became the idol of countless girls of the same age. During registration, a large number of students skipped classes to participate in each competition area.

Relevant experts believe that "Super Girl" directly invades "minors" and "education", two areas that have always been regarded as "must stick to" by society. This program targets girls aged 15 to 17 as the main contestants, which is unimaginable for Fox, which produces "American Idol", because the laws of the United States have strict regulations and minors are not allowed to participate in commercial performances, even though our country does not There are clear legal provisions that the rights of minors must also be supervised and protected.

Real record of children receiving direct passes

Many children still came to participate in Super Girl this year. In the auditions in the Chengdu division, a child who was only a few years old even received a direct pass. Encouragement like a pass encourages more children to participate. Currently, most of the people on the Super Girl final stage are students. They have little social experience and are prone to errors in their judgments about the outside world. If this happens, the psychological harm to them will be huge.

Benefits behind the scenes

Because teenagers in their 10s lack rationality, only for this age group can there be fanatical FANS, who will use any means to send text messages to vote

p>

[This post has been edited by the author on 2005-8-10 17:08:59]

----------------- -------------------------------------------------- -------------

-- Author: Walker Without Borders

-- Release time: 2005-8-10 17:08:27

--

Which acupoint does "Super Girl" hit on you and me?

"I like 'Super Girl' and I support He Jie!" The person who said this was a male university professor who had already graduated, had a doctorate, and loved classical music.

This can’t help but make the reporter a little stunned - I thought that the audience attracted by a program like "Super Girl" is at best a group of boys and girls who like pop music.

The popularity of "Super Girl" contrasts with the shabby status of traditional communication studies, and also shows the huge power of the public to support the media in the Internet era. The top six of Hunan Satellite TV's "Super Girl" 2005 were decided last Friday (August 5). Contestant Li Yuchun's support rate on Sina.com has exceeded 1.72 million votes, ranking first. There are 824,000 searches for “Super Girl” on Google, plus 246,000 searches for “Super Girl” that many people mistakenly wrote. “Super Girl” has become a more popular trend this summer than Typhoon Maisha. .

Cultural diversity and flamboyant individuality

“I was very touched to see this group of young people working hard for their dreams on the stage, showing their individuality and charisma. "The professor explained.

"Many middle-aged viewers may like this program because they hope to find the 'indulgence' they missed when they were young." Sun Wei, a professor at the School of Journalism at Fudan University, explained that "Super Girl" makes middle-aged people crazy reason.

Twenty years ago, when the professor was still at the age of today’s “super girls”, modesty and restraint became the characters respected by the entire Chinese society. "At that time, personal character and thoughts were habitually suppressed, and the whole society was very dull." Sun Wei said.

Twenty years later, Sister Furong appeared and the blogger appeared. Chinese society is increasingly tolerant of different cultural phenomena and values. "Go your own way and let others say it!" has become a declaration of autonomy and independence for the younger generation.

"Society's approval and pursuit of individuality, personal struggle and personal success have laid a profound social foundation for the success of "Super Girl"." Sun Wei said.

In addition, China's cultural products have also been diversified in recent years. TV programs have developed from single news to today's soap operas, sitcoms, variety shows, live sports, talk shows, dating columns, talent competitions and Reality shows like “Super Girl” and more.

"In the process of marketization, the media in mainland China are following a path of relying on functional expansion to increase the degree of differentiation to meet people's needs for cultural diversity." said Yu Guoming, a professor at Renmin University of China.

On the contrary, such programs will not arouse strong repercussions in places such as Hong Kong and Macau. "This type of program requires a certain region and market. No matter how different people are, some viewers can always find a certain player in the audience." I see something that I can identify with," Sun Wei said.

The world is crazy for entertainment

"Super Girl" is actually just part of the craze of civilian talent shows that are broadcast live on global television. Its TV format is very similar to the Idols TV template that is now popular all over the world.

On February 9, 2002, when Will Young and Gareth Gates met in the PopIdol finals on ITV, 14 million viewers cheered for them in front of the TV, accounting for 57% of the viewers at that time. Among them, the viewing share of young viewers aged 16 to 34 reached 72%.

That night, 9 million telephone calls were made to participate in the idol voting within two hours, setting a new record in the history of British telephone voting.

Other countries are also suffering from the Idol "hurricane". Currently, 30 countries and regions have obtained the Idols template license, with a global TV audience of 110 million and more than 1.5 billion audience votes. The United States, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, India, Australia, the Czech Republic, Turkey, Croatia, Slovakia, France...Idols are also invincible, and local ratings records are frequently refreshed.

"Super Girl" disintegrates authority and shows the most grassroots reality. The zero-threshold "no limit on age, no limit on region, no limit on occupation, no limit on appearance" gives ordinary people the opportunity to appear on TV, satisfy their desire to perform, and at the same time, they may sign with a record company and gain both fame and fortune.

In the UK competition, Will Young became the champion and received a record contract worth 1 million pounds; in the same year, the runner-up Gareth Gates also topped the UK charts with his song Unchained Melody and won the He won the British Music Award for Best Television Performance and was received by the Queen of England.

Similar things also happened in China. "Super Girl" champion An Youqi signed with Tianyu Media Co., Ltd. and released the album of the same name "An Youqi" two months later, setting a domestic record for the fastest signing and release of an album in 2004.

For the audience, this type of program is novel and highly interactive. "Vote for your favorite contestant to keep her in the competition, which gives the audience a sense of being in charge, rather than the traditional sense in which TV audiences are always 'forced to accept' edited content," said Sun Wei. .

In addition, viewers see uncertainty in entertainment programs just like watching football games. The changes in SMS voting make every audience look forward to the ending. "I can't predict the outcome of the game. There is a lot of suspense here. This also attracts me to watch every game - who will be eliminated in this round?" spectator Chen Jing told reporters.

The controversial nature of the referee has also become one of the highlights of the show. Simon Cowell, one of the judges of British Pop Idol, is famous for his harsh and unsparing words.

In the "Super Girl" special topic on Sina, there were 1.7 million comments about the controversial referee Ke Yimin. A TV producer told reporters, "Such programs are usually intentionally produced to make the referees controversial, with some singing the praises and some being the villains, and they can be adjusted based on public opinion to always maintain a better degree." Ke Yimin Zihai Since the election, he has been criticized by the audience for his harsh comments, but since the finals, he has changed his attitude and focused on passionate encouragement. On August 3, Ke Yimin resigned from the position of judge of "Super Girl" and once again became the focus of news.

At the same time, the controversial voting results have also made the popularity of this program continue to rise. The final result will certainly not be agreed by every viewer, which has triggered a lot of speculation, and new media such as the Internet and mobile phones have Provide them with a place for discussion.

Recently, shady rumors about "Super Girl" have been circulating among the people, and some people even claimed to know that the results of the competition were predetermined, which made many viewers watch the show with a verification attitude.

Returning to the popular nature of television

"Why is 'Super Girl' so popular?" When a reporter asked this question, Hu Zhengrong, a professor at Communication University of China, said: "This shows that Chinese television Returning to the essence of mass media." Bao Xiaoqun, director of the Program Research Center of Shanghai Media Group, also said: "The 'Super Girl' phenomenon is a normal phenomenon, but the media's attitude towards it has deviated somewhat. "

"The mission of television is to entertain first, then to educate and inform. Many viewers watch TV for entertainment. The popularity of 'Super Girl' shows that Chinese TV is coming back. Come to the nature of entertainment and publicity," Hu Zhengrong said.

"Super Girl" has become a popular entertainment venue. "I fell in love with 'Super Girl' only through watching the auditions. There are all kinds of people in it. It's so fun!" said audience member Hu Xiaofeng.

Idols have achieved international success; today's serious culture was once popular culture. "Watching TV in an international environment and looking at culture in the long river of history, it's no surprise that 'Super Girl' is so popular," Hu Zhengrong said.

In addition to "Super Girl", some other TV stations have also launched similar types of music talent show. Although they have achieved certain success, their attention is slightly lower than that of "Super Girl".

“The reason is very simple, they are not popular enough!” Hu Zhengrong said with a smile.

"Looking back on 'Super Girl' a few years later, its impact on Chinese television is comparable to that of 'Focus Interview'. In history, which TV station dares to broadcast a variety show for 4 hours , except CCTV’s Spring Festival Gala?” Bao Xiaoqun asked.

“Compared to the ‘full control’ Spring Festival Gala, Hunan Satellite TV is producing a history-making TV program.” Sun Wei said.

Hunan Satellite TV started off by relying on entertainment programs such as "Rose Date" and "Happy Camp". The ratings once ranked first in the country. The prime time advertising price even exceeded that of the CCTV comprehensive channel, creating a brand that attracted the attention of the media industry. The “Hunan TV Phenomenon”.

In 1999, Hunan TV and Radio Media went public. Hunan Satellite TV introduced social capital, expanded the industrial chain, and developed related industries such as film and television exhibitions, cable networks, and real estate. "However, due to the long investment front and poor management of many related industries, Hunan Satellite TV's advertising revenue in 2002 was only half of what it was at its peak." An insider told reporters.

In 2003, Hunan Satellite TV adjusted its investment strategy, repositioned the entertainment industry as its core competitiveness, carried out a comprehensive revision, and launched the call sign of "Happy China". "In 2003 alone, Hunan Satellite TV's advertising revenue doubled." The person familiar with the matter said.

While enjoying the popularity of thousands of people, "Super Girl" has also suffered a lot of criticism: vulgar, shady, and detrimental to school education... In July, two issues of CCTV's "Focus Interview" talked about television The program was vulgar and aimed directly at "Super Girl".

According to people familiar with the matter, relevant state departments have sent experts to "Super Girl" and hope to halt the broadcast of the program. "The popular culture and expression of personal rights and desires embodied in 'Super Girl' may translate to other aspects of society." A sociology professor told reporters.

Is "Super Girl" scarier than other information on the Internet? Are the calls for a ban making a fuss out of a molehill? Don’t more people just watch it and then laugh it off? Industry insiders pointed out that what lies behind "Super Girl" is not only the public's aversion to preaching, but also huge commercial profits, and cancellation is unlikely.

[This post has been edited by the author on 2005-8-10 17:09:31]

--------------- -------------------------------------------------- ---------------

-- Author: Walker Without Borders

-- Release time: 2005-8-10 17:42:38

--

My personal evaluation of "Super Girl" is both positive and negative, but the overall evaluation tends to be negative.

From the perspective of a former media worker, "Super Girl" is first of all a very successful media plan, representing the current trend of popularization and entertainment of television. The high ratings in itself are enough to respond to those Criticism that cannot eat grapes but says grapes are sour.

From an intellectual's perspective, "Super Girl" cannot escape some of the chronic problems of Hunan Satellite TV in terms of its overall operating model. The show's methods are completely copied from the West and Hong Kong and Taiwan, but there are too many behind-the-scenes operations behind the show. In turn, it breaks the proper rules of entertainment, and entertainment becomes fooling. To use an inappropriate analogy, this is like dragging out all the cadres at the department level and above in the province and shooting them, and basically none of them will be found guilty; but if you line up the cadres at the department level and shoot every other one, there will definitely be some who are wronged, but some will be wronged. Those who slipped through the net, the so-called "super girls" top 20, top 10, that's basically the concept. In addition, there is no doubt that "Super Girl" objectively leads wrong public opinion towards minors, and the reason behind it is self-evident.

Also: CCTV did not hesitate to use two issues of its flagship program "Focus Interview" to make insinuations and criticize "Super Girl". I think it is unwise and disdainful. Of course, this is CCTV's usual way of doing things. They always try to rape the TV audience with their own views. Typical examples include the propaganda orientation of the Kosovo War and the Iraq War, and as recent as the five central scenes of the brawl in the Chinese men's basketball game. Using the most professional equipment to produce the most unprofessional news and television, sad!