BTS

Geon-Cheol Shin () and Mark D. Whitaker ()
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Geon-Cheol Shin: Kyung Hee University
Mark D. Whitaker: The State University of New York, Korea (SUNY Korea)

Chapter Chapter 6 in The Korean Wave in a Post-Pandemic World, 2023, pp 481-504 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract There are many factors of BTS’s success mentioned before attention will be focused on the importance of this fresh kind of “digital fandom.” This media presence of BTS has millions of spectators and interactions with their daily life instead of only the more traditional kind of intermittent group communications and intermittent fans that just occasionally watch a popular Korean boy group that shows their songs and dances online primarily. Nowadays an approach for priming a fresh boy group via a social media service (SNS) fandom seems more rational since it less costly and a far more durable way to prime a group’s popularity in an ongoing daily way, online, instead of having to ‘recharge’ it regularly with vast capital of one-way mass media campaigns that can cost millions. So, instead of an expensive original popularization achieved via sponsorship in the mass media of TV shows or radio play in multiple national markets, BTS’s fandom is based on a cheaper yet deeper virtual community of using a globally-distributed technology of personal smartphones, tablets, and Internet connections. All the factors around BTS’s success when combined did more than allow BTS quickly to rise to the top of the world’s musical and dance acts. The ongoing communication with their online fandom has allowed BTS to perch there for many years in an ongoing way, even ‘suspended’ there between album releases and video releases—and to remain popular even despite being temporarily disbanded while some members fulfill their required Korean military service. This ongoing popularity in many ways the result of BTS’s “digital fandom.” The scale of this massive digital fandom is summarized.

Date: 2023
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DOI: 10.1007/978-981-99-3683-0_6

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