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7 Youth, Social Media and Transnational Cultural Distribution: The Case of Online K-pop Circulation Sun Jung (Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore)

Since the late 1990s, Korean popular culture has circulated broadly across the Asian region and to a lesser degree the global cultural market via a phenomenon commonly known as the Korean Wave or Hallyu (Chua & Iwabuchi, 2008). Popular television drama series like Winter Sonata (2002), Dae Jang Geum (2003–2004), Full House (2004) and Boys over Flower (2009) have met with great success in many Asian countries including Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong and Thailand. Recently, K-pop (Korean popular music) has been widely circulated via new media technologies such as fan-blogs, peer-to-peer websites, video-sharing websites, micro-blogging and mobile internet.1 Employing K-pop circu- lation as its primary case study, this chapter examines how youth social media activities reinforce and construct a new global cultural dissemina- tion model that I identify as social distribution. I use this term to refer to distribution practices enabled by fans’ online social networks, which involves distribution across fan bases in different regions of the world, thus allowing for the simultaneous, multidirectional and transnational circulations of creative products. Advanced digital media technologies render the global pop culture market landscape extremely changeable, and through these channels Korean pop products have become visible in a range of online and offline markets globally. As demonstrated by the case of K-pop boy band Super Junior, which topped the Taiwanese music chart KKBox for over 100 weeks (2011–2012), K-pop songs often rank highly on local music charts. K-pop has also risen in visibility in Australia since the late 2000s when it first appeared on radio shows and at club parties, leading to national television station SBS establishing the regular programme PopAsia which is dominated by K-pop music

Bennett, A., & Robards, B. (Eds.). (2014). Mediated youth cultures : The internet, belonging and new cultural configurations. ProQuest Ebook Central <a onclick=window.open('http://ebookcentral.proquest.com','_blank') href='http://ebookcentral.proquest.com' target='_blank' style='cursor: pointer;'>http://ebookcentral.proquest.com</a> Created from griffith on 2021-02-22 15:28:41.

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videos. In Indonesia, so-called I-pop (or Indo pop) idol band music became one of the most significant socio-cultural phenomena in 2011, largely inspired and influenced by K-pop idol music and its visual styles. However, youth fan group-led online K-pop inflows existed in these various pop markets long before the KKBox chart, SBS PopAsia and the I-pop phenomenon. These once-marginalised virtual pop flows have evolved over time into major and in some cases even mainstream phenomena.

These cases demonstrate how creative content can freely cross cultural borders and enter into local mainstream markets via non-commercial online transmission by local youth fans and their activities. The current online K-pop flows signify the deconstruction of a conventional schema of mono-directional cultural flows once predominantly led by media conglomerates (particularly Western ones), and reinforces the construc- tion of a new paradigm of multidirectional creative distribution, which accelerates cultural divergence. Web 2.0-driven participatory youth culture is not only ‘subordinate and subversive’ (Hall & Jefferson, 1976), but also economically substantial. Within this emerging transnational social distribution paradigm, youth culture is identified not only through the notions of ‘youth-as-trouble’ and ‘youth-as-fun’ (Hebdige, 1988), but also through the notion of youth as active agents in the transnational circulation of popular culture products. Recent research has already challenged the simplistic opposition between ‘subversive’ and ‘mainstream’ culture (Buckingham, 2008: 5), and everyday youth interactions with digital media reinforce the blurring of boundaries between these oppositional concepts. Buckingham remarks that we need to acknowledge how ‘commercial forces both create opportuni- ties and set limits on young people’s digital cultures’ (2008: 5). Using the empirical case study of K-pop online fandom, this chapter explores how it achieves this kind of blurring in the realm of digital technology- empowered youth culture in order to form a basis for understanding newly arising youth-led media cultural transmissions in the global creative industries.

Youth, Social Media and Asia as the Pop Prosumer

The focus of this chapter is twofold: firstly, it asks how recent develop- ments in youth participation in social media and its interactions with transcultural flows of popular content combine to produce the defini- tion of social distribution applied in this chapter. Secondly, it examines how social distribution is distinguished from the established cultural

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distribution paradigm, which is predominantly led by global media conglomerates. With the increased emphasis on dynamic user participa- tion, social interaction and collaboration, the current Web 2.0 internet environment enables social distribution. It is thus useful to look at the recent K-pop phenomenon through the conceptual framework of emerging transnational youth culture driven largely by their collective autonomous participation. I use ‘transnational’ here rather than ‘global’ as the former more accurately illustrates how cultural products cross national borders through the virtual border-crossing activities of youth groups. It is also crucial to point out how social distribution enhances cultural divergence, while deconstructing earlier understandings of cul- tural globalisation that are often associated with the notion of cultural imperialism (Crane, 2002; Schiller, 1979; Tomlinson, 1991). According to earlier treatments, cultural globalisation refers mainly to cultural domination by core (predominantly Euro-American) countries over peripheral ones. However, cultural flows are not necessarily one-way but are multidirectional, often flowing from the periphery to the core (Berger, 2002; Crane, 2002). The cultural imperialist theory also fails to acknowledge the significance of local sovereign power upon and resistance to the dominant culture, and ignores processes of negotiation, adaptation and indigenisation of the receiving countries (Lull, 2000; Robertson, 1994). Elsewhere I have argued that this cultural imperialist theory cannot fully explain the current phenomenon of Korean popu- lar culture flows (Jung, 2011a). This is particularly true in the case of online K-pop flows, which are multidirectional and driven largely by the sovereign decision power of youth groups in various – both core and peripheral – local pop markets.

In recent years, an emerging field of scholarship has examined how youth fan community practices are increasingly incorporated within the logics of media industries (Green & Jenkins, 2009; Jenkins, 2006; Johnson, 2007; Murray, 2004; Shefrin, 2004). Youth activities on social media are the key to social distribution as I define it here. So far, only limited research is available about online youth communities on social networking sites, their cultural consumption and distribution practices and their impact on cultural economies. As key users of grassroots media, with the rise of social media technologies youth networks speak to and interact with a vast number of users simultaneously across borders, through which they can easily reproduce and mass-distribute cultural products from various origins. Youth studies scholars have acknow ledged the significance of youth and youth cultures in the mobilisation of ideas and goods, and the creation of globalised cultures within transnational

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contexts (Helve & Holm, 2005; Suárez-Orozco & Qin-Hilliard, 2004). Advanced digital media enhance this mobilisation even further. They are relationally linked via their participation in an online social net- work that is an exemplar of the radical connectivity of our digital era (Stornaiuolo et al., 2011). Such participation reinforces cultural flows of ideas, artefacts, texts and images across national, cultural, textual and linguistic borders (2011). However, existing research on recent online cultural distribution centred around youth social networking remains marginal to the discipline as a whole. Social media are the newest and most extensively used communication tool among youth (Reich, 2010; Subrahmanyam et al., 2008), encouraging the development of transfer- able and valuable socio-cultural and technical skills in both formal and informal learning processes (Crook & Harrison, 2008; Ito et al., 2008) and also enabling youth to actively participate in ‘networked publics’ through producing and circulating cultures and knowledge (Benkler, 2006; Shirky, 2008; Varnelis, 2008). Although there is a field of schol- arship around the distribution practices of grassroots media that has acknowledged their increasingly significant role in the Web 2.0 era ( Jenkins, 2006), there currently exists no broader conceptual analysis that provides a specific paradigm of youth social networking practices in relation to the global cultural industries. This chapter will address this absence by offering a new way of thinking about the role of online youth practices within the transnational pop distribution paradigm.

East Asia in particular demands special attention with regard to the growth of creative industries and markets and the development of information technology, two essential facets of this new transnational distribution paradigm. The emergence of this new paradigm in the region stems from the development of digital infrastructure and hardware that has been strengthened by the national innovation strategies of each country. In the early 21st century, East Asian companies domi- nated almost all key aspects of digital equipment manufacture, albeit with stepwise shifts in design and manufacturing from Japan to Korea, Taiwan and most recently China (Holroyd & Coates, 2012: 149). East Asian digital manufacturing provides a strong example of the effective- ness of national innovation strategies. In Taiwan, the government has had a series of multi-year projects in the information technology sector including e-Taiwan (focusing on information technology), m-Taiwan (focusing on mobile technologies), and u-Taiwan (focusing on ubiqui- tous computing) (Holroyd & Coates, 2012: 155). It is not only physical infrastructures, but also the creative content industries, that these East Asian states have recognised as important. Due to the global economic

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resurgence in 2010, the size of the global creative markets has increased by 4.6 per cent to US$1.4 trillion, and the growth rate of the Asian market (6.3 per cent) is the second highest after the South American market (12.2 per cent) (Kim & Kim, 2011). According to Kim & Kim’s analysis of the regional creative market share (creative industry sales volume) of GDP in 2010, Japan is ranked 5th and Hong Kong is 10th while Korea is second only to the UK. Another analysis reported the total creative industry sales volume of Korea as US$64 billion and its total exports as over US$3.2 billion (KOCCA, 2011). As such, Korea’s creative industries are continuously expanding their export market and, along with Japan, Taiwan and Hong Kong, Korea has now become one of the major exporters in the region.

The high penetration of advanced digital technology in the daily lives of consumers across the region is another crucial facet to address. Amongst the top five internet service markets, three are in Asia – Japan (1st), China (3rd) and Korea (4th) (Kim & Kim, 2011). The rapid deve- lopment of digital technologies and the creative content industry sector reinforces new media network-driven transnational creative distribution in the region. Strong user growth in social media in the region allows instant, simultaneous and multidirectional circulation of pop content. For example, India is the third largest user of Facebook followed by Indonesia (4th) and the Philippines (8th) (Socialbakers, September 2012). In Indonesia, youth aged 18 to 24 constitute the majority of the social media user population – 40.55 per cent (Hui, 2010). According to my previous research on Indonesian youth fandom of K-pop, over 95 per cent of questionnaire participants specified that they mainly use the internet to consume and circulate K-pop, among which almost 91 per cent of them chose social media (Facebook and Twitter) as their first preference (Jung, 2011b). Youth consumers and their increasing online pop consumption practices are behind this transnational social distribution paradigm.

Youth as Social Distributors: The Taiwanese Case

This study is part of an ongoing longitudinal project called ‘Social Media and Transnational Cultural Distribution in Asia’. For this pro- ject, I have collected fieldwork data from Indonesia, Thailand, Taiwan and Singapore. The ethnographic research of the Taiwanese case study and industry analysis in this chapter expand earlier findings and offer new critical insights into the role of youth as social distributors. Between 2009 and 2012, I conducted archival research on aspects of

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globalisation, cultural distribution and digital youth culture. I have also conducted online participant observation research on various fan pages and channels on social media websites such as Facebook and YouTube. From May to August 2012, I collected 121 questionnaires from Taiwanese K-pop youth fans, and conducted email and telephone interviews with industry professionals in related fields such as music and social media. The questionnaire participants were aged between 18 and 24, and most were students. Of those who took part in the study, 105 were female and 16 were male (Table 7.1).2

Table 7.1 Demographic details of questionnaire respondents (gender)

Gender Female Male

No. of respondents (%) 105 (86.78) 16 (13.22)

Table 7.2 Responses to the question, ‘How many hours are you online every day?’

Hours spent online/ day

Less than 1 hour

1–2 hours

3–4 hours 5–6 hours 7–8 hours More than 8 hours

No. of respondents (%) 1 (0.83) 3 (2.48) 35 (28.93) 28 (23.14) 43 (35.53) 11 (9.09)

Today, a large percentage of youth access and consume popular products through online media. In my previous study on Indonesian youth, 91 per cent chose social media such as Facebook and YouTube as their first preference for consuming K-pop online – the three main reasons offered for this were ‘easy access, fast update, and low-cost’ ( Jung, 2011b). Many mentioned how ‘connectedness’ is another impor- tant factor in choosing social media as they can ‘keep in touch with’ other fans and/or their beloved idols (2011b). Members of this young generation are the so-called ‘digital natives’ (Prensky, 2001), and their mode of cultural consumption and distribution is already ideally con- figured to various new media forms including text messaging, blogs, micro-blogs, social networking sites and video-sharing websites. With quickly advancing smartphone technologies, this is rapidly moving to the mobile internet environment. As in the Indonesian case, these Taiwanese youth typify the digital native, and their digital technology- driven lifestyle is evident from the large amount of time they spend on online activities every day (Table 7.2).

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Over 96 per cent of the respondents spent more than 3 hours online every day, while over 35 per cent stated that they spent 7–8 hours online. Of those 11 respondents who spent over 8 hours, some expressed that they were online about 12 hours per day, while one men- tioned that she spent more than 16 hours online daily. While the rate of youth access to the internet varied from country to country, previous research has indicated that, globally speaking, youth on average spend more time online than older generations. For example, in 2002 market research suggested that online spending by young Americans (18–24) was four times greater than that among older age groups (Pastore cited in Osgerby, 2004: 160).

It is also important to note how much of this online time is spent on K-pop activities such as watching music videos, reading K-pop news articles and chatting with other fans about K-pop. The highest percentage of participants spent 1–2 hours (38.84 per cent) followed by 3–4 hours (27.27 per cent) and 5–6 hours (13.22 per cent). The majority of respondents spent at least 1–8 hours on K-pop activities online, while two respondents spent over 8 hours a day (Table 7.3).

Table 7.3 Responses to the question, ‘How many hours do you spend on K-pop activities online?’

Hours spent on K-pop activities online/day

Less than 1 hour

1–2 hours 3–4 hours 5–6 hours 7–8 hours More than 8 hours

No. of respondents (%) 13 (10.74) 47 (38.84) 33 (27.27) 16 (13.22) 10 (8.26) 2 (1.65)

Table 7.4 Responses to the question, ‘Which online platforms do you use for K-pop activities? (Choose three)’

Social media platform preferred

YouTube PTT Facebook Twitter Kpopn Tudou Weibo

No. of respondents 107 56 53 22 20 14 10

It is worth considering the notion of the digital native in the Taiwanese context, as it is one of the highest social media-penetrated countries in Asia. As the above figures indicate, Taiwanese users spend a significant amount of time online and many of the Taiwanese young people inter- viewed for this study mentioned that it was their ‘habit’ to log into certain web platforms to check the latest news about their favourite artists and related information. For the question ‘Which online platforms do you use for K-pop activities?’, 107 out of 121 participants chose YouTube while 56 chose PTT, one of the biggest bulletin boards in Taiwan (Table 7.4).3

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Significantly, there is a difference in the preferences of Taiwanese and Indonesian youth. The former prefer using the local platform PTT over the Western-origin social media platforms, namely Facebook and Twitter. In the case of Indonesian youth, after YouTube (90), Twitter (77) was the second most preferred channel to consume K-pop content, while only 22 Taiwanese participants chose Twitter.4 This is because Taiwanese participants have rather diverse options in their own language such as PTT, Kpopn (Chinese-language K-pop news website), Tudou (Chinese-language video-sharing website), and Weibo (Chinese- language micro-blogging website). Such diversity in K-pop consump- tion channels reflects the long and rich history of Korean pop culture fan networks in Chinese diaspora communities that have been active in different parts of the global pop culture markets. For example, a high proportion of the video content on Tudou and Youku is Korean tele vision programmes. Finally, some minor responses include another micro- blogging service Plurk (7), an English-language K-pop news website allkpop (5), another Chinese-language video-sharing website Youku (4), and some Korean portal websites like Naver and Daum.

Taiwan is renowned for its high smartphone penetration. According to the questionnaire survey result, 79 participants (65.29 per cent) owned smartphones. However, in regard to the overall time online, participants spent comparatively fewer hours on K-pop related activities when on their mobile phones: 45.57 per cent answered that they spent less than 30 minutes, while 21.52 per cent specified that they spent 1 hour every day. Again, among those who participate in K-pop activi- ties on their mobile phones, the majority answered that they listened to music, watched music videos and read K-pop related news.

The Taiwanese research participants specified three main reasons why they chose social media platforms for consuming K-pop: the speed of updates, convenience, and the range of resources available. Like Indonesian youth, Taiwanese youth also mentioned speed as the most important element in terms of using social media for consuming K-pop, with 73 participants (60.3 per cent) indicating it was a key factor. Many emphasised their appreciation of receiving information in close to real time. These participants chose Twitter because they could receive ‘first-hand’ information ‘immediately’ and ‘directly’ from their artists. Comments made included the following:

The fan pages on Facebook would update latest and immediate infor- mation. (TW10, TW15, TW23, TW28, TW33, TW51, TW78, TW110, TW116, TW118)

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1. YouTube: to listen to and watch K-pop immediately. 2. PTT: the information on many specific group boards update fast. 3. Twitter: to follow Korean stars’ status immediately and directly. (TW104)

K-pop board (on PTT) has immediate video links or links for watch- ing live programs very often, so I usually can receive information simultaneously. (TW99)

Twitter, I can follow people from any country, no matter what latest gossiping information released by any country or official Twitter, could be gained immediately. (TW75)

On Twitter, following the status of artists and friends to gain first- hand message. (TW116)

The second and third top-ranking reasons participants offered to sup- port their choice of social media platform were convenience and the range of resources available, respectively. Many participants highlighted ‘plentiful and lots of information’ (e.g. TW92, TW108) as an important feature, as well as the ‘diversity’ of information (e.g. TW45, TW88). Some pointed out how these platforms provide them with ‘complete’ information.

1. YouTube has abundant videos, it has most users around the world, which is easier to find the videos or music I want. 2. The content in PTT you find is complete…and the information and source are plen- tiful. 3. kpopn reports the latest information in a way that is adaptive to Taiwanese K-pop information receivers, and also because the infor- mation has already been collected and translated, it’s convenient to read. And the contents are abundant! (TW4)

As is evident from TW4’s comment, for these young Taiwanese users it is also important to consume various forms of information – audio, visual and text – in one place. This aspect therefore unites both the issue of convenience and quantity of material and information available.

Another key reason raised was connectedness. Many mentioned how they ‘communicate’, ‘interact’, ‘share’, ‘chat’ or ‘get in touch’ with other fans or with their chosen idols. TW73 stated, ‘[I use] Twitter because most K-pop stars have their own Twitter account where they would share their daily feelings. The fans would feel they are closer to their stars.’ Twitter has become an important way for many fans to follow their idols, and increases a sense of connectedness with them. Twitter is

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faster and more immediate than other platforms, and gives the impres- sion (although this may not materialise) of possible direct communica- tion. Elsewhere I have discussed how Twitter has influenced dramatic shifts in star–fan dynamics (Jung, 2011b). Twitter has changed these dynamics between stars and fans with different national and language backgrounds, and has greatly diminished the language barrier within transnational fandom. I identify three key aspects in communication between the stars and their overseas fans through Twitter. First, com- munication tends to be smooth thanks to many translation groups on Twitter who immediately translate K-pop idol stars’ tweets as soon as they are uploaded. Second, the photos and videos uploaded by stars do not require written or verbal explanation. Third, the 140-character limit on tweets encourages non-native-English-speaking K-pop stars and fans to post in short English sentences. It appears that more and more K-pop stars are communicating with their overseas fans via Twitter. The emergence of Twitter has not only changed the dynamics of overseas K-pop fandom, but has also created a new paradigm of transnational K-pop distribution ( Jung, 2011b).

There are three main differences between the Indonesian and Taiwanese responses: price, issues of translation and issues of quality. Only one Taiwanese participant celebrated the ‘cheap cost’ of social networking, compared with the Indonesian participants where a majority highlighted this as a crucial factor. Many Taiwanese participants also indicated that they could easily acquire translations via certain online platforms, particularly Kpopn:

Kpopn: Even though it’s not a formal news website, but it gathered a group of fans who love K-entertain, and who usually translate artists’ Twitter and Korean first-hand news and information. (TW78)

Kpopn: It’s easy to receive the latest K-pop information, and trans- lated information, which is released by Korean official sites. (TW93)

On Facebook, the information has been translated by the administra- tor, I can receive messages in Chinese. (TW1)

The ways in which these Taiwanese youth discuss translation differ from the views of the Indonesian participants, reflecting shifts in their socio- cultural backgrounds. The issue of translation is closely linked to Chinese fan sub groups (subbing or subtitling), which have been active for decades, even predating the online era. These groups can translate a one-hour TV programme and post it on Chinese online video-sharing websites such

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as Tudou and Youku within hours of its broadcast. Lastly, many respond- ents mentioned that they use YouTube because of the higher quality and more reliable streaming of videos. TW18 states, ‘It’s faster, clearer and smoother in watching programs.’ It is significant that they consider not only the quantity but also the quality of products. In this sense, both the Taiwanese and Indonesian participants demonstrated both differ- ences and similarities in their responses. This suggests that while there are shifts in the characteristics and inclinations of these youth from different regions stemming from their unique socio-historico-cultural contexts, there are still some areas where they merge. This, in turn, indicates that further in-depth comparative research is required to explore more fully the online pop consumption and distribution habits of each group.

Combination Between the Bottom-Up and Top-Down Models: ‘Gangnam Style’

Using Taiwanese youth online practices concerning K-pop fandom as a case study, this chapter has looked at the essential elements of a newly emerging mode of transnational pop distribution. This does not suggest that this newly emerging pattern of youth-led social distribution is com- pletely separated from the existing media industry paradigm. It rather attempts to demonstrate how youth practices have become a crucial part of the pre-existing global pop distribution paradigm, while such prac- tices are still under the strict control of a corporate-led environment. It is crucial to explore how social distribution is constructed through interactions and collaborations between mainstream distribution bodies such as iTunes, major record companies, K-pop entertainment companies, youth networks on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, and sometimes local entertainment management companies in countries of reception.

The current notable rise in the circulation of K-pop demonstrates how social distribution operates within the new creative indus- try paradigm. The above-mentioned combination model places the recent phenomenal success of Psy’s ‘Gangnam Style’ as a particularly strong example of this. Since the music video was released on 15 July 2012, it has gone viral online. Within two months, the video had surpassed 200 million views on YouTube and by 29 September 2012 Psy had topped the Billboard Social 50 for the fifth week in a row.5 On 21 September 2012 the Guinness Book of Records announced it was the most played YouTube video of all time (Milano, 2012). There

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are four primary driving forces behind the success of ‘Gangnam Style’ and its transnational (particularly US) circulation, which while chronological are also to some degree cyclic: social media, mainstream media, management, and online music stores and their associated rankings. Most immediately, social media and online K-pop networks lay at the heart of the song’s huge success from the outset. The music video was initially released through Psy’s management company YG Entertainment’s official YouTube Channel, from where it was circulated among existing K-pop fan networks on YouTube, Facebook and Twitter. As an extremely successful internet meme,6 it leaked outside these areas into the mainstream through the rise of so-called ‘reaction’ and parody videos on YouTube (some of which themselves have become YouTube sensations), coverage on popular US celebrity websites like Gawker.com, and even being mentioned on Twitter by famous celebrities like Katy Perry, Tom Cruise, T-Pain and Britney Spears. Additionally, mainstream network television programmes in the US like Eye Opener and Big Morning Buzz showcased the music video, and included shots of their cast and crew mimicking Psy’s signature horse dance in their studios. The role of Psy’s management also must not be underestimated. Due to his signing with the influential US talent agent Scooter Braun (manager of teen sensation Justin Bieber) in August 2012, Psy was exposed to a much larger American audience via his appearance on the MTV Video Music Awards on 6 September, which was followed by appearances on major television shows such as The Ellen Degeneres Show, The Today Show and Saturday Night Live. These appearances again helped in part to propel the phenomenon to even further success, with ‘Gangnam Style’ ranking at the top of the US iTunes Video charts for over a month, and number one in the Top Song charts in ten countries including the US. Suggesting the cyclic nature of these driving forces, these rankings then continued to see Psy and ‘Gangnam Style’ rise in their positive coverage on social media.

Corporate media power holds a great influence over grassroots-driven social distribution, and vice versa. As William Gruger observes:

Psy’s Schoolboy Records/Universal Republic partnership announce- ment, along with the continued soaring popularity of the song, helped Psy to remain secured in the No. 1 spot. A 69% increase in weekly overall fanbase acquisition was fuelled by 92,000 new Facebook fans, 54,000 new Twitter followers and 95,000 new YouTube subscribers. ‘Gangnam Style’ currently sits above 150 million YouTube views. (Gruger, 2012)

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The Psy case study suggests that the combination of a social network- driven bottom-up model with a more recognisable media-led top-down model constitutes the newly emerging social distribution paradigm. It begins with the grassroots practice of youth fans sharing their interests with each other in online social networking groups and then combines with the corporate forces of mainstream media to create substantial cultural flows.

The Korean media often compare Psy’s case with The Wonder Girls, a group that spent three years in the United States attempting to break into the US pop market. The Wonder Girls had a huge online fanbase as well (although the main fanbase was in Asia), learned English for three years, worked with US producers and released their singles in English. Overall, however, their attempt is considered a relative failure. Psy broke into the US market and achieved remarkable success within two months. His border-crossing is worth studying further because it signi- fies the new paradigm of transnational creative distribution empowered by bottom-up grassroots activities on which this chapter has focused. His song is sung in Korean and he did not physically cross a national border (until invited to work with Scooter Braun), so there was no local marketing promotion. On the other hand, under their management company JYP’s strategic global market expansion scheme, The Wonder Girls physically crossed the border to the US, recorded their US debut single ‘Nobody’ in English, followed by the second single ‘Two Different Tears’, and were distributed through iTunes as well as through offline music stores. In special promotion, their ‘Nobody’ remix CDs were even sold for just one dollar in Justice Stores, a popular retail fashion chain across the US aimed at teenage girls. Even with such an assertive local promotion and corporate-controlled top-down marketing strategies, their border-crossing music distribution was not successful. The Wonder Girls’ three years represents the old distribution model while Psy’s two months represents a newly emerging model that this chapter refers to as social distribution.

Conclusion

Social media is now one of the most significant pop culture distribution channels, not only in terms of fan networks, but also as part of the cul- ture industry’s marketing strategies. YouTube has become the key mar- keting tool for any K-pop product attempting to cross cultural borders. All major entertainment companies have their own YouTube channels (e.g. SM, JYP, YG, Cube, Loen Entertainment) and actively promote

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their products internationally. The total hit counts of the videos of the top three K-pop entertainment companies – SM, YG and JYP – reached 2.3 billion in 2011, almost three times higher than the previous year (Woo, 2012). YouTube is not only a marketing tool but has also become a new revenue model. These K-pop companies signed a ‘content part- nership’ agreement with YouTube: they provide YouTube with K-pop content and they share the revenue (i.e. multinational enterprises’ advertising fees), which enables the dynamic online distribution of K-pop music (Jeong, 2012). As such, mutual collaborations between global media corporations, YouTube, K-pop entertainment companies as well as fans’ social networks enable the current dynamic transnational flows of K-pop.

By examining these collaborations and interactions, this chapter has developed an analytical framework to better understand the dynam- ics between grassroots practices on social media and corporate media practices where the boundaries between conventional and alternative cultural distributions are blurred or unclear. Employing the case study of the consumption of K-pop by Taiwanese youth, this chapter is among the first pieces of academic research to address the newly emerging transnational social distribution practices of young pop consumers in the region. This digital generation utilises social media platforms and mobile media predominantly to consume and distribute K-pop. The success of Psy’s ‘Gangnam Style’ demonstrates that this social network- empowered grassroots practice is a crucial part of the pre-existing global pop distribution paradigm within the corporate-led media environ- ment. It is a substantial reciprocal online and offline distribution circle consisting of different media forces that continuously influence each other, and thus constitute the core of the emerging transnational social distribution paradigm.

Notes

1. For instance, there are over 320 million ‘K-pop’ related websites found on Google (15 September 2012, English only). On Google Trends (search volume index), the search volume for K-pop has exceeded the one for J-pop ( Japanese pop music) since late 2009. Before the emergence of K-pop, J-pop had been the most widely recognised Asian popular music genre.

2. Although I am fully aware that the younger demographic group is even more active in terms of such social media-driven pop culture distribution, I did not include it. This is due to the complexity of the ethics (IRB) approval, which would inevitably delay the research process.

3. The participants were advised to choose up to three platforms. 4. Again, multiple selections were allowed.

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5. The Social 50 chart ranks the most popular artists on YouTube, Vevo, Facebook, Twitter and MySpace, using a formula that blends weekly additions of friends/ fans/followers along with weekly artist page views and weekly song plays.

6. Internet meme refers to a concept, an idea or a style that spreads from person to person via the internet.

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