Quote:
Originally Posted by totoum
Not sure using CD sales alone to judge popularity is such a good idea, someone like Sawashiro Miyuki isn't exactly known for her singing.
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The rationale that more units sold = more people willing to spend money on that person = more popular is over-simplified, but unfortunately it's about the only metric we have to work with in the entertainment industry, and it's no different for seiyuu. Mizuki Nana's undisputed popularity in the industry is based preciously on her personal CD income, the scale of her lives etc, otherwise, she doesn't actually do a lot of voice work for anime, usually only having one or two roles per season. If you use the number of anime characters per season/number of anime radio shows as a gauge for popularity, then compared to someone like HanaKana and Sawashiro Miyuki which could easily have 6 roles (and main characters too), Mizuki Nana would be highly unpopular, but then you'll be hard press to argue that point, unless you can prove that with shows that feature more voice-acting focused seiyuu can consistently boost income for an anime (eg no matter how crap the show is, the fans will buy a show based on their favourite seiyuu), similar to how Hollywood gauge their actors, then you may have an argument. Otherwise personal CD income = popularity, cynical but just the way the world works.
EDIT: Below is CD single sales ranking for 2012~2013 (up till May 2013) thus far for female seiyuu:
女性声優最新シングル累計
102,924 2012/08 水樹奈々 (Mizuki Nana) BRIGHT STREAM
*22,631 2012/07 堀江由衣 (Horie Yui) 夏の約束
*22,492 2013/04 田村ゆかり (Tamura Yukari) Fantastic future
*17,822 2013/02 井口裕香 (Iguchi Yuka) Shining Star-☆-LOVE Letter
*16,830 2012/07 小倉唯 (Ogura Yui) Raise
*16,091 2012/07 坂本真綾 (Sakamoto Maaya) モアザンワーズ
*15,518 2012/10 戸松遥 (Tomatsu Haruka) Q＆A リサイタル!
*15,119 2013/01 花澤香菜 (Hanazawa Kana) Silent Snow
*14,746 2012/08 StylipS Choose meダーリン
*12,155 2013/05 スフィア (Sphere) GENESIS ARIA
*12,111 2013/04 三森すずこ (Mimori Suzuko) 会いたいよ...会いたいよ!☆
*11,581 2012/12 豊崎愛生 (Toyosaki Aki) オリオンとスパンコール
*10,870 2013/01 竹達彩奈 (Taketatsu Ayana) 時空ツアーズ
*10,147 2013/01 中島愛 (Nakajima Megumi) そんなこと裏のまた裏話でしょ?
**9,173 2013/04 茅原実里 (Chihara Minori) この世界は僕らを待っていた
**9,086 2013/04 上坂すみれ (Uesaka Sumire) 七つの海よりキミの海
**8,481 2013/01 喜多村英梨 (Kitamura Eri) Miracle Gliders
**7,915 2012/04 寿美菜子 (Kotobuki Minako) ココロスカイ
**5,267 2012/06 高垣彩陽 (Takagaki Ayahi) 月のなみだ
**4,560 2013/04 栗林みな実 (Kuribayashi Minami) ZERO!!
**3,585 2013/02 平野綾 (Hirano Aya) TOxxxIC
It's actually not too bad of a reflection of popularity as you pretty much see all the current "hot properties" reflected in the ranking, even if you adjust for some of those names on the list with their abilities to actually sing.....