Former celebrities who make their AV debut are not entirely unheard of in Japan. However, it seems that the power of AKB is unmatched even in Japan’s porn industry. A recent thread makes note of how much a former AKB member got paid to make her AV debut.

The member in question is Nakanishi Rina. Never heard of her? I actually never heard of her either. She apparently was part of the first generation, but graduated way back in 2008! That’s right, she graduated right around when AKBingo had just started.  It seems she was on it for a few episodes too.

For her entry into adult entertainment, her stage name was apparently “Yamaguchi Riko”, and she was active in her AV career from 2010 to 2012. Some odd and very interesting facts about her career, according the Japanese wikipedia article:

• When she first started doing semi-nude gravure, she didn’t use the name Nakanishi Rina, and all her stats were changed. However, it still said, “Former AKB” on her profile.
• Apparently, she did very well. Her debut video sold 80,000 copies For comparison, an adult movie in Japan is considered a success if it sells 10,000 copies.
• After her porn debut, she held some promotional event in January 2011. In that event, fans from her AKB days came to support and greet her.
• She quit her AV career in 2013, and later became married in 2013. She apparently has a child as well!

Anyhow, the source article makes note of the highest grossing celebrity porn salaries. Nakanishi (or Yamaguchi?!), came up as #1, with 300,000,000 yen (or $3 million USD).

Quite a bit, and apparently highest of all time. I unfortunately don’t recognize any of the other names, but the #5 entry is about $300k.

And if you’re wondering about the top-most image: Nakanishi is the one on the far left, sitting next to Takahashi Minami.

Source: http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/やまぐちりこ
Source: http://akb48mtm.blog.jp/archives/32076115.html