Asian Junkie Asian pop. Without discretion.
Lovelyz member Seo Ji Soo has recently made headlines for embarking on a career as a streamer, though the reaction to the choice and what she revealed during her debut were more interesting to me.
Lovelyz haven’t made a release since September of 2020 and have been technically on “hiatus” since they almost all (except Baby Soul) left Woollim Entertainment in November 2021. During her stream, Seo Ji Soo spoke on the chances of the group reuniting and placed it at 5%.
“I’m not sure if we could make it happen, but we’ve been talking about holding a concert.”, she said.
“The chances are like five percent, but who knows? I believe it’s possible because CEO Lee Jung-yeop of Woollim Entertainment loves us a lot. However, each member is busy with their schedules, and we all are with different agencies. Still, we’ve been doing our best to make it happen.”
As for why she decided to start streaming, she admitted things haven’t been going well on the acting side of things.
When asked why she decided to become a streamer, the singer shared, “I’ve been pursuing acting opportunities, but things haven’t been going well for me lately. I chose to start streaming after carefully considering what I could do well in a world where trends are constantly changing.”
“I hesitated a lot, to be honest. I was concerned about how this would affect my image.”, she added.
“My career in the entertainment industry has experienced highs and lows. As I’ve gone through both success and failure, all I want now is to stream with a happy heart and people I love to enjoy my streaming.”, Seo Jisoo remarked.
She also shared why she chose gaming as her focus, “I enjoy watching edited gaming videos. Not that I’m skilled at games, but I wanted to try game streaming because I like to play them.”
While I get the apprehension and I understand the reputation of streamers, I really have always felt like this was a natural setting for many idols to make money. They have a buff by being some kind of public figure and presumably having some level of skill and built-in things to talk about, plus doing fanservice is basically their whole gig.
Fans don’t want them to go this route because it’ll supposedly ruin their image, but to me, I think most of that sounds like them not really wanting to get to know their favorite idol outside of company controlled narratives because they’re afraid that they are no different than the problematic streamers they dislike. Plus, I especially don’t want to hear it from people who likely sabotaged Seo Ji Soo’s image by buying into pre-debut rumors started about her by an older man.
Anyway, predictably her streaming career is off to a fast start, with her totaling around $4k in just four hours of work. Of course, it won’t always be like that as the excitement over her debut will wane a bit, but I’m glad she’s seeing some return on the time she’s put into her career so far, especially after other Lovelyz members have spoken out about their unpleasant time under Woollim.
