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The story
Cooking expert Ryuji addressed on X on October 28 the circumstances behind his departure from Nippon TV’s “Hirunandesu!” Quoting a news account’s post about the show, he shared claims that for five hours of being tied up on set, his fee was only 20,000 yen, and that he was dropped from the show immediately after simply appearing on a rival network’s competing program in the same time slot. On 5ch, some doubted there was anything new here (“we’ve heard this story many times”), while others reacted with shock at how low TV industry pay apparently is (“paid less than an AD,” “that’s 4,000 yen an hour”), and many also questioned the broadcaster’s own practice of banning appearances on competing shows in the first place.
Cooking expert Ryuji — [The Dark Side of TV] Addresses His Hirunandesu Departure: “Please don’t dig this back up”
Cooking researcher Ryuji updated X on the 28th, addressing the reason behind his departure from Nippon TV’s “Hirunandesu!”
Ryuji quoted a post from a news-aggregator account titled [The Dark Side of TV], which summarized the circumstances of his exit from “Hirunandesu!” The account explained that he was “tied up for 5 hours for a fee of just 20,000 yen” and was “fired on the spot just for appearing on a rival network’s competing program.”
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
For real.
Probably why he's not getting booked anymore — this is the only material he's got.
Is this literally the only story he has?
Online news sites keep recycling the same article over and over these days.
Makes you wonder how little actual reporting they're doing.
Apparently he figured it'd be fine as long as it was a day he wasn't scheduled to appear himself.
It's just a rule the network made up on its own, so it's not like it's absolute.
Ryuji makes 5 million yen in 2 hours elsewhere, so going on TV actually puts him in the red.
It's 20,000 yen for 5 hours lol.
Even by regular-person standards that's underwhelming.
It's 20,000 yen for 5 hours.
That's 4,000 yen an hour.
TV networks always use this exact logic to lowball everything.
They pay celebrities generously, but they don't pay the shops they visit on location, don't compensate people for items borrowed as props — and then lose them somewhere on top of it.
That's less than what the AD (assistant director) working there makes.
ADs get like 10,000 yen for a 24-hour shift.
Yeah.
They've always treated what they call 'amateurs' poorly, but it's gotten noticeably worse in recent years.
They've always been stingy paying anyone who isn't a celebrity.
For a regular person that's not bad, honestly.
4,000 yen an hour — work the legal standard hours and that's over 600,000 yen a month.
A college student tutoring part-time makes more than that.
I was getting like 5,000 yen (per session).
Explain properly what your actual point is.
What exactly did you want done about it?
Think about what commercial broadcasting actually runs on lol.
There's no such rule, regulation, law, or contract.
They just want to keep talent tied down.
And for a YouTuber it might be even cheaper.
Basically networks operate on a 'we're letting you appear' mentality, and only pay well to talent agencies they're cozy with.
NHK's base fee is low, but apparently rehearsal and standby time earn pay too.
So it's actually not that cheap.
Background and Points of Debate
“Hirunandesu!” is one of Nippon TV’s flagship daily programs, and it frequently brings on YouTubers and cooking experts as guests. There has long been talk within the industry that networks effectively ban guests from appearing on a rival channel’s competing program airing in the same time slot. This time, the topic resurfaced after Ryuji himself quoted a news-aggregator account’s post about it on X.
Opinions on the thread split mainly along two lines. First was how to judge the fee itself — “20,000 yen for 5 hours tied up (roughly 4,000 yen an hour)” — with some saying that’s not bad pay for an ordinary person, while others argued it’s far too little for a popular cooking expert to receive. Second was whether the network’s rule of dropping a guest immediately for appearing on a competing show is justified, with some calling it a natural consequence of how commercial broadcasters make money, and others dismissing it as an arbitrary network policy with no legal basis.
As a caveat to this article, it’s worth noting that the “5 hours for 20,000 yen” figure comes from the aggregator account’s summary — Ryuji himself did not directly explain the details or amount behind his departure.
*This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geinou/Sports News+) thread “[YouTuber] Cooking Researcher Ryuji on the Reason for His Hirunandesu Departure: “20,000 Yen for 5 Hours” / “Fired Instantly Just for Appearing on a Rival Show”.”
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