Interest

Air Comiket Livestream Accumulates Over 440,000 Views Over 4 Days

The online "Air Comiket" livestream, which replaced the physical Comic Market 98 dojinshi convention, accumulated a total of 443, 357 views over the course of four days, according to data posted by the Comic Market (Comiket) Committee's official Twitter account. The Air Comiket hashtag also inspired approximately 68,000 unique tweets, posted or retweeted by 283,494 unique users. The data also includes Twitter engagements from April 12, the day the Air Comiket event was announced.

The event was part of a broader initiative called "Ganbarō Dōjin!" (Do Your Best, Dōjin!) which signal boosts dojin creators listed in the Comiket 98's original catalog. Physical books were printed and sold through e-commerce websites, which were highlighted on the livestream.

The previous Comiket 97 event, which was held from December 28-31, drew 750,000 people across four days, breaking its winter and all-time attendance records. Until Comiket 96, the biannual event was held across three days rather than four.

Hajime Okada, who was worked in the printing business for almost 30 years, told the NHK that the "Air Comiket" event has been a boon for their struggling livelihoods.

"Printing itself has been on the decline. When Comiket was cancelled, we were in despair, since it couldn't have come at worse timing ... Even though the event didn't happen, I'm grateful that there was a movement to print books. Of course, it can't compare to a real-life event, but the orders have been coming in daily without fizzling out."

Comic Market Committee representatives Yoshiyuki Fudetani and Kōichi Ichikawa said that they were immensely grateful for the support they have received, and described the Air Comiket event as a gesture of determination to keep moving forward without looking down.

In an earlier Nico Nico livestream on April 12, Ichikawa stressed that buying the catalog will support the event in the future, and that Comiket 99 will be directly affected by the sales. The catalog briefly became the bestselling book on Amazon Japan following the announcement of the event's cancellation on March 27. Toranoana and Melon Books are offered bonus illustrations drawn by dojinshi artists and other goods for those who purchased or pre-ordered the catalog through their stores.

The physical Comic Market 98 convention was originally scheduled to take place at Tokyo Big Sight until it was canceled to help prevent the spread of the new coronavirus disease (COVID-19).

The committee noted that it cannot confirm if the Tokyo Big Sight venue will be available this December, or in July and August of 2021, since the Tokyo Olympics has been postponed from this summer. "Plans for Comic Market 99 (Winter 2020) will be announced separately, once the schedule and venue have been confirmed."

[Via Otakomu]