Many K-pop companies and artists are involved with NFTs now, and that market figures to only grow from here as it certainly seems like the next frontier that companies will try to monetize, especially with ta young and impressionable fanbase likely seen as a demo ripe to exploit. While there’s significant pushback among K-pop fans so far, eventually the sheer omnipresence of NFTs in the market might overwhelm even that sentiment.
The current backlash, though, is why most celebrities and companies have chosen just to announce them and stay relatively silent to collect their checks or whatever, but Sunmi and ABYSS Company have responded to the backlash from fans, perhaps in ways that are not advisable.
On WeVerse, Sunmi released a statement in Korean that reads terribly and comes off like her telling fans that if they don’t like it then leave. It got to the point where a fansite had to try to explain the tone in a way that doesn’t sound completely dismissive and shitty.
Either way, it’s not the best look.
What stood out to me is how the statement angles at exploiting any parasocial relationship developed, basically asking the fans to trust in her that she wouldn’t do anything to hurt them.
The backlash got to the point where the company also released a statement.
It says a lot of nothing, realistically, but attempts to assuage any concerns with some damage control within the fandom.
Anyway, it doesn’t appear that she or the company will be backing down, so it must be a hell of a payday and the company must really believe it’s going to become a core part of their operations going forward. Bleak.
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For those wondering what the hell all this shit is even about, here’s a collection of quality work on the topic of NFTs, and I found this thread to be quite good as well (or here for more bleak mess).
Quite frankly, I just find them wholly unnecessary. Everything they are involved with could be executed as well or (usually) better without them, and that’s even before getting into any moral or ethical concerns that are explored in the writing above.