K-Pop Ranter

SM, YG, JYP & Star Empire Finally Step Up Against Chart Manipulation

Posted by : KPopRanter August 07, 2013

Oh, snap! You better hide your kids, hide your wide and hide your husband because the biggest bullies of K-Pop are coming after the digital sajaengi, filing a report against it and asking the good-for-anything-but-policing police to investigate the claim. As released by both YG and JYP, the reason as to why they're against it goes as shown:

YG - "Digital sajaegi ['mass buying'] must be stopped as agencies which properly release digital albums are at a disadvantage, and the public [lost] faith in music site charts' fairness. Digital music business need to work together and a preventative measure must be put in place to prevent these illegal acts."

JYP - "The manipulation which [hurts] agencies that release and distribute music fairly and tarnish the faith in digital music sites has to be immediately stopped. All digital music businesses must work together to arrange a system to prevent the corruption of music businesses and manipulation of digital numbers."

You better run, run, run, run, run~ Literally.

I feel as if these companies have every single right to be mad, making a smart move by filing a report and finally getting to the bottom of the illegal digital chart manipulation. I mean, though a lot of people would believe that these companies have "nothing to lose" and always top the charts because of course, they're home of the largest groups, it still is unfair for the non-manipulators (the companies filing the complaint) whether or not it's a member of the Big 3, Star Empire Entertainment or a nugu company, they'll all lose money, group popularity or as said by YG, music site chart's fairness and reliability because in the end, someone who doesn't deserve it is topping the charts, raking in money, getting extremely popular, winning music shows over your own artists and more. Likewise, when you see the big 3 companies coming together in harmony, you have to believe that shit got real and it's damaging them more than we could ever even dream of. As many netizens and people already pointed out or guessed, it seems as if the people who'll have the biggest trouble/be looked at will be not only SISTAR with their unexpected rise on the charts (odd how on music shows, their digital points are extremely high but viewer preference and album sales aren't even close), but also Crayon Pop (although, I find it unlikely they manipulated charts with Bar Bar Bar) and the companies Cube and Brave Brothers.

On a different note though, SISTAR is at a metaphorical coin toss here, if you say. If they land on heads and are actually caught purchasing the digital sajaengi, they should say goodbye to their careers... in fact, I feel as though disbandment is basically the only option left. Due to their lack of a huge, stable fan club to fall back on like with T-ara with their scandal, they'd be at a loss completely, be unable to recuperate and lose all reliability, faith and of course, sales. However, on the other hand if they actually didn't purchase a digital sajaengi and just got lucky with Alone, they could seriously just flip everyone off for suspecting them and definitely speak up about the unfairness of the Big 3's power when handling situations, maybe, even gaining more supporters and fans of SISTAR through that action... not to mention, SISTAR will still be on their winning streak, continuously rising with each and every song they release while other groups start to fall from their heights.

As a final point, illegal chart manipulation is wrong, all groups having to work their way up the hard way whereas with just the snap of a finger, you fly to fame. By the same token, although I can't necessarily say which groups actually did it and when (SISTAR, I'm secretly looking at you), I can say that whoever it is who gets caught is seriously fucked.

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