Alodia Gosiengfiao
Alodia: The Social Network
Congratulations to cosplay goddess Alodia Gosiengfiao on becoming the first cosplayer in history to reach one million fans! To commemorate this historic milestone in geek culture, here’s an image of Alodia styled as the movie poster from The Social Network, the film that reveals the origins of Facebook.
You can easily imagine Alodia as the Mark Zuckerberg of cosplay. Facebook’s mission is to give people the power to share and make the world more open and connected. Similarly, Alodia’s influence gives cosplayers the power to share their creativity with wider audiences. She makes the cosplay world more open and connected. You don’t get to one million fans without revolutionizing cosplay.
(Original photo by Ashley Gosiengfiao.)
Alodia’s Fantasy: Geek Girl in Charge
One of the keys to a geek idol’s appeal is her uniqueness. People don’t want to see her as just another pretty face, just another cookie-cutter starlet. People want to see what’s going on inside that crazy, quirky, geeky mind of hers. That’s why Japanese cosplay idol Shoko Nakagawa is the blog queen of Japan: people actually want to witness her geeky antics online.
Too many mainstream producers can’t comprehend that. Too many mainstream producers neither understand nor tolerate a geek idol’s geekiness. Too many mainstream producers try to take a geek idol and turn her into something safe, something kosher, something their limited imaginations can handle. It happened to Shoko early in her career, when she was initially cast as just another bikini idol.
Avoiding the Starlet Trap
“Acting like everyone else is boring. If I just can stay true to myself, I know I can do anything.” — Haruhi Suzumiya, Bouken Desho Desho? (English version by Cristina Vee).
By and large, cosplay goddess Alodia Gosiengfiao has managed to avoid the cookie-cutter starlet trap. Her hosting gig with Animax highlights her anime geekiness, even letting her blog about it on Animax’s site. Her endorsement deal with the Japanese online game TinierMe gave her gamer geekiness full expression, even letting her design a completely original game character from scratch. Her ad campaign with Globe Telecom focuses completely on her cosplay geekiness, successfully highlighting that a girl who posts a lot of cosplay pictures could use Globe’s broadband service.
If people want to see a geek idol’s geekiness, then why not give her geekiness full expression? Why not give her complete creative control?
That’s exactly the idea behind Alodia’s new show. Click here to continue reading “Alodia’s Fantasy: Geek Girl in Charge”…
