The Super Girl phenomenon in China

IN THE summer of 2005, a singing contest was held by Hunan Satellite TV. The show, “Mongolian Cow Sour Yogurt Supergirl Contest,” was such a hit across the country that state media estimated that the grand finale of dancing and singing drew 400 million viewers on the night, nearly one-third of China’s population, more than the combined populations of the United States and Britain.
Millions happily paid special fees to submit their votes via cell phone. Some 8 million, mostly younger, Chinese paid the equivalent of 2 cents to send a “text message of support” via cellphone for one of the three Super Girl finalists.Supergirl historically recorded the highest audience rating ,even exceeded China’s most important TV Show, Lunar New Year Celebration ,which hold by China Central Television Station annually.
At the night of the final competition, August 26 2005, you could barely find young girls and boy hang around on the street or working in the office, they all tried to sit in front of the TV, enjoy this national celebration for those faces coming out from their classmates or close friends.PPlive ,a internet p2p TV program website, set a record of 260,000 clients watching one show concurrently at that night.The competition imitated the framework of American idol, including the step by step elimination from 150,000 applications nationally.But in terms of social influence and commercial power, it obviously surpassed its counterpart in United States.
The other superising feature is that people were becoming insane about all the idols selected from grass-root normal school girls.These fans grouped togather to support their ideal candidates ,advertising on local newspaper, debating on online forum, coming up all possible means to encourage people around them to vote for their idols.All the gossip and competition related news of this entertaining programme has been listed on nearly most of mainstream newspapers and magazines.With the large space of exposure on newspapers, supergirl was immediately becoming the country’s hottest topic among youngest as well as their parents’ generation.
“Super Girl” winner Li Yuchun, a pop singing major at the Sichuan Conservatory of Music, has become a new pop icon for her boyish charm and unconventional personality. With her tomboy-style hair and a shy smile, appears on the cover of the latest edition of Time Asia Magazine, issued on Monday, as one of the 25 Asia Heroes of 2005.
According to the magazine, the influence brought by the “Li Yuchun phenomenon” goes far beyond her voice in China. Her “attitude, originality and a proud androgyny” are challenging the country’s traditional customs.
Supergirl is also highly lucrative for the station, with a 15-second advertising slot going for 159,306 yuan ($19,700). Income from advertisment overnight reached 2 million yuan ($247,322). The phenomenal number of viewers meant that advertising rates soared, beyond what China Central Television charges for spots on its most popular programs. Revenue from SMS voting will add 25 million ($3 million).
The main sponsor, Mongolian Cow Dairy, went from third-largest to the largest dairy in the country during the show’s run. Sales more than doubled, according to the Shanghai Daily newspaper.The China Europe International Business School announced that it would make the “Supergirl” show a case study for its master of business administration program.
Many reasons contribut to the success of the ‘super girl’ program.
First, the super girl contest enjoys the massive populariry and involvements.One of the major reason is that it has no requirements, any female, young or old, talented or not, can participate — not just the beauty-queen types from central casting. This is quite vary from other contests with complex selction porcessure, standards and technical requirements, which makes the common people feel that it’s a long distance and beyond their reach to become a star. In this way, the ‘super girl’ won more affection than anyother contest. As long as you like,with the courage, you can try.Since April this year, 150,000 female(aged from 6 to 89 years) pooled over to the regester center. In Hangzhou,Zhejiang province in Southen China, a girl lined up for 12 hours for regesteration.”[Super Girl] represents a victory of the grass-roots over the elite culture,” argues Beijing sociologist Li Yinhe.
Secondly, the slogan of the contest as ‘Controls the stage, to change destiny, affirms oneself, the value experiences’ appeals to the youths. The panic shows their desire to participating in the social events, self-exposure and curiosity to the new things. This mirrors the impetuous social convention in some way. In fact, the heat of ‘super girl’ is closely linked to the strong desire for people’s ‘hit-celebrity quick ‘desire.
Thirdly, the massive entertainment ness of the ‘super girl’ meets the wishes of the youths to shake off their dull school life. Most of the fans of the ‘super girl’ are middle school or campus students. Suffering from the extremely pressure of examination and schoolwork burden, some entertainment is quite in their appetite.
Some commentators suggested that the success showed that people liked the power of the vote and maybe would like to choose their political leaders in the same way.Anyway, every coin has two sides, apart from the favoring comments; there also exist disagreeing opinion. Some scholars argued that the ‘super girl’ is of low taste and nothing different with the beauty contest. However, who can deny the strong motivation of 4 million people brought by the ‘super girl’.

 Max Lee
 (The Daily Mail’s Special Correspondent in Beijing)