Disc 4 Q3
Q3) How is the K-pop industry’s concept of liveness, as shaped by live broadcasting models and live voting practices (discussed by Kim Suk-young in chapter 2) a commentary on its expectations for both domestic and global fan behaviour?
In chapter two of Kim Suk-Young’s book K-pop Live, Kim suggests that while both audiences appreciate a sense of liveness, domestic audiences are satisfied or prefer a more mediatised version of live broadcast while global audiences require a production that is what would often be considered more “authentic” or containing seemingly more liveness.
I hesitate to make as bold a statement as this, due to one of the core topics of the book being that liveness is relative and can come in many forms, but it is clear that there are different expectations of liveness that the industry believes differentiates the domestic and the global fans.
While Kim uses a number of different definitions for “liveness”, in chapter two this liveness refers to how closely a broadcast is to watching a performance in person and in real time in contrast to the term “mediatised” which loosely refers to how much influence the media has on before public consumption.
To this extent, based on live voting shows, it would appear that domestic Korean audiences either accept or prefer a more mediatised version of broadcast. Despite the shift to digital media and often abysmal ratings, these shows TV shows are still quite popular and integral to the industry. In Kim’s visit to a live recording show she notes that only every second show is actually performed live with pre-recorded performances interspersed to ensure a smooth broadcast in a limited timeslot (2018: 68). Additionally, she quotes Music Core’s chief producer, Park Hyun-seok, who public stated that “only ten to twenty percent of performers actually sing live on stage”. These two points suggest that the industry expects that domestic audiences prefer broadcasts with a higher balance of mediatisation than liveness in favour of a smooth broadcast. However, liveness is still expressed in these shows in the form of live audience and fan voting at the end of the show. I believe that the industry does this because it expects that domestic fans want to have a say in which Hallyu stars succeed and doing so in real time, or “live”, is a great way of engaging the fan base.
In comparison, “…the world music market is still very much driven by live music.” (Kim, 2018: 74). Kim argues that the industry expectation of global music markets places a premium on live performance and interaction. This point of view comes from her observation of the massive success of international live concerts and more importantly, Arirang’s After School Club and its unique model of live fan interaction. This format, while initially riddled with technical errors, allowed for a few lucky fans to have conversations and express themselves to their favourite Hallyu stars live, even performing for them. The opportunity to interact with the stars live has proven to be incredibly attractive and an effective way for starts to reach global popularity. The success of After School Club and the following moves to maintain a sense of liveness show that the industry expects that global fans favour liveness over mediatisation specifically trading off smooth production for the opportunity to see and interact with the human side of Hallyu stars.
Chapter two of Kim Suk-Young’s K-pop Live suggests that the industry expects that domestic Korean fans prefer a mediatised broadcast and are willing to trade liveness in favour of smooth broadcast and the ability to have an effect on their favourite idol’s career. In contrast, global audiences favour liveness, and are willing to trade smoothness for the ability to interact with their idols on a personal level. Kim offers a few explanations as to why these differences exist but these reasons tend to relate more to the ways that the industry operates and I am curious to hear from both foreign and domestic fans as to if and or why they prefer these respective styles and if there is any overlap between them.
References
Kim, Suk-Young. K-pop Live: Fans, Idols, And Multimedia Performance. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2018.
Aaron Leong, 68460237
Asia327 Dean 
Aaron, the conclusion is a bit awkward, esp. the last sentence, you might want to try to edit that a bit, but otherwise I enjoyed reading your essay, and to me it proved your engagement with the ideas.
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Will do, thank you Doctor.
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Hi Aeron! I totally agree with what you suggested in your essay. I think you have already fully understood Kim Suk-young’s idea and I don’t think I could add anything. So here I’m going to analyze a little bit about the reasons why domestic fans are satisfied with mediatized live broadcast while global fans require a more “authentic” one from my experience of being a global K-pop fan who also keep up with the domestic live broadcast.
From what I’ve seen, the most important factor is that many global audiences, especially those who are exposed to western culture, are more familiar with the more authentic way of live broadcast because that’s what most of the western artists do. We can also learn this from the idea John Lie holds (which is also noticed by Kim Suk-young in the introduction). He believes that modern authenticity is tied to the notion of sincerity and staying true to oneself. He even criticized that K-pop is a mercenary pursuit and does not stay true to its art. In order to satisfy this kind of European romantic ideal, K-pop needs to change.
What’s more, unlike domestic fans, global fans are less likely to get in touch with their favourite idols. While domestic fans could run into their idols around Hongik University or wait for their bias at the entertainment agencies’ downstairs, the global fans could only browse SNS and thumb up for the video clips that domestic fans took and comment “I’m so jealous.” And of course, there won’t be as many live concerts in other places of the world. So it’s not surprising that After School Club turns out to be successful among global fans. The fans finally got a chance to interact with their idols and it’s in real-time, it definitely helps the global fans feel they are also loved by their idols directly.
When it comes to the domestic audience, I believe higher expectation of the audience is an important reason why mediatized live broadcast are more common. The entertainment agencies don’t want to disappoint the fans who would have an impact on the idols career so they are not willing to take the risk of live broadcast.
That’s what I can tell from according to my knowledge. I believe there are more reasons, however.
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Hi Aaron, I really enjoyed this essay because it showed a good understanding of how Kim analyses the different interaction with “liveness” that domestic and global fans forge. As the question asked for how this presence of “liveness” thus creates expectations for fan behaviour, it would’ve been interesting if you attempted to study how fans conform or disagree to these models of “liveness” that are imposed upon them. For example, what do domestic fans who attend music show recordings think about these multiple recordings in attempt to achieve “liveness”? Surely some might enjoy the fact that they pay for “one” recording but get multiple performances (thus more time spent watching their idols) out of it? Regardless, thank you for this essay!
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