AKB48 “elections” inspire crazy otaku bulk purchases (again!)

It’s that time of year again.

With the AKB48 “elections” taking place to see who gets to sing in the next song, Twitter is awash with pictures of boxes of CDs and tickets purchased by passionate otaku fans.

One fan has shared images of towers of boxes, boasting that they spent 1,917,800 yen on them — and paid for on delivery in cash to the mail man too! They now have thousands of CDs to play to their heart’s content.

Another is meant to have shared images of 1,614,400 yen’s worth of merchandise — about half a year’s salary for most people.

Or there are piles of tickets to hand-shaking events — representing thousands of chances to shake an idol’s hand.

Of course, some of these images may be fake, but then again, we have been here before…

The election is currently being led surprisingly by exiled Rino Sashihara, these days a member of the Hakata spin-off of AKB48 following a previous scandal.

246 girls from the various AKB groups are competing to appear in the upcoming thirty-second single. Voting continues until June 7th so we can expect more crazy otaku pictures soon.