Social Media, Self and Society - K-Pop Case Study
- Loi Dao
- Mar 30, 2018
- 5 min read
Back to the 1900s, when dial-up telephones and printed newspaper were still in their golden age, it was hard to foresee how far things would change in the next century. The birth of Web 2.0 in the early 2000s came with the advent of New Media as a combination of technologies, their users and usage, and their involved contexts (Flew as cited in Lievrouw and Livingstone, 2005). This has introduced media convergence, which allows consumers to choose when, where, and how they can access to the media content. Undoubtedly, social media has facilitated the shift in the nature of many professions and the relationship between industry professionals and their public. The entertainment industry is not an exception. This case study will critically analyze the change the relationship between celebrities and their audience, as well as the change in the nature of Korean Pop (K-Pop) industry.
K-Pop ?
K-Pop is a term referred to a modern form of South Korean pop music, inspired by many music styles and genres, such as Latin, jazz, reggae and electronic dance. The popularity of K-Pop dated back from the 1990s, turning it from a domestic product to be more global in reach (Laurie, 2016). The more K-Pop rises, the more complicated it becomes due to many factors involved in K-Pop celebrities' relationship with its audience and its new nature.
K-Pop enables a participatory culture
According to Jenkins, H (2016), in a participatory culture, the audience can create, curate, circulate, and/or critique content. With the help of social media, there is a two-way interaction between K-Pop celebrities and their potential public.
Many K-Pop entertainment companies have utilized social media platforms to promote their artists. For example, they open YouTube account to upload their artists' Music Videos and Behind The Scene (BTS) footage. Below these videos, fans can comment their thoughts and share among their fandom. Through engaging in this "imagined community", fans can interact not only with their friends of similar interests but also with strangers who they might not know before.
Besides, many YouTube channels have also been opened by their fans to upload their idols' videos recorded by them (fan-cams) in broadcasting live shows or other promotional events. Thanks to these fan-cams, many idol groups have been revived from being unpopular among the public to rise to become top stars. A legendary individual fan-cam of EXID's Hani recorded by her fan went viral, attracting more than 25 million views on YouTube now can be a great illustration in this case. The spreadability of this video is possible thanks to the "technical affordances" that make it easier to share, the "social networks" that bring people together, and the "diverse motives" behind (Green and Jenkins, 2011, p. 112). It can also be seen that viral content can be produced by the audience and spread by the audience, not necessarily by the "top-down organizations" (Cassidy, 2018a).
As Youtube is a global video-sharing platform, many young, aspiring celebrities have used YouTube to showcase their talents. Jae - an American-Korean K-Pop idol - used to upload his singing videos under the account named @yellowpostitman which attracted more than 51,000 subscribers, when he was still in the States. A talent manager in South Korea then discovered him and later on, Jae was scouted to sign a contract to receive training under JYP Entertainment and became a part of DAY6 -a five-member boy band- in 2015. Then, Jae, from a "micro-celebrity" (Marwick, 2013), has marketed himself successfully through the help of social media to finally become a truly K-Pop star.
Source: yellowpostitman
Moreover, many entertainment companies have strategically used the power of "crowd creativity" to engage with the audience more. For example, DAY6 used to have a program where their fans could write one or two lines of lyrics in the real-time comments in their live stream videos, and then they would compose a song based on those lyrics for their fans. In doing so, DAY6 have successfully engaged with their target audience through gathering their fans' ability to create a potential piece of music.
Source: DAY6
On top of that, BTS - a seven-member K-Pop boy group- has recently overtaken top stars like Justin Bieber and Selena to win Top Social Artist award at Billboard Music Awards 2017. Promising as it is, more world-wide records are expected to be broken by K-Pop idols thanks to their active engagement with their fans on social media in the future.
K-Pop redefines the privacy and identity of K-Pop celebrities
According to Westin as cited in Papacharissi and Gibson (2011, p. 79), the privacy of individuals, groups, or institutions can be understood as how, when, and to what extent information about them is communicated to others. A private space is considered where individuals to retreat themselves from public appearance to do activities that are of their interests, whereas public is where individuals can manifest him/herself (Cassidy, 2018b).
However, the context of private and public has been blurred in the case of K-Pop industry. In the past, Korean celebrities kept most of their personal lives in privacy. It was hard to imagine how the 1900s - K-Pop star could openly talk about his/her love life in public. But now, the general public is more aware of celebrities’ private lives as they are willing to disclose different aspects of their lives via social media platforms (The Korea Herald, 2017).
DAY6 is an example of a K-Pop group, whose members are opting to let their fans know more about their daily lives on social media. They have published many videos of them eating while broadcasting and have done many live stream videos to show their apartment, in which they were living together. Truly, this is the “publicly private and privately public" new era of social media (Papacharissi and Gibson 2011, p. 75).
Source: randomstuffs
Social media is also a public platform where many K-Pop idols can express their personal perspectives; however, many of them had gone under public rage just because of voicing their own opinions. Korean actor Yoo Ah-in used to be dragged in a social media debate on November 2017 by touching on the issue of "feminism" and the widespread "men-hating" trend in Korea. He shouted out to the so-called 'feminists' who were trying to destroy the reputation of famous people and violating their rights, causing the victims to suffer (KpopJoA, 2017). Many had shown support for his courageous act, but overall, Yoo had been verbally attacked with criticism by Korean citizens on social media.
Another important thing to note is that the privacy of many idols has been seriously evaded, together with the rise of social media. This can be demonstrated by the case of "sasaeng" fans. They are infamous fans who want to pry into their idols' personal lives by stalking them through their real-time updates (Jung as cited in jiajiakhoo, 2015). For instance, if a celebrity tweets a picture of him/her at a particular shopping mall on Twitter, "sasaeng" fans would be able to find the location of him/her within a click. Then, they can easily spread the information via social media, further enhancing their circle of more "sasaeng" fans to join. "Sasaeng" fans even resort to worse behaviors, such as breaking into the idols' private apartments to take pictures and steal their items (jiajiakhoo, 2015).
Source: JVD
To sum up
All in all, it is evident that social media has facilitated the change in the relationship between K-Pop celebrities and their fans, along with the change in the nature of their profession. With incessant advancement in technology, it is expected that social media will exert a more profound impact on K-Pop industry in particular, and on entertainment industry in general in the future.
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