itzResearch Question: How does the extensive commercialization of the K-pop industry impact both the performers and the fans of the genre?
De Guzman, Alyana. “EJAE Reveals Why She Never Debuted with SM Entertainment despite Being a K-pop Trainee for 12 Years.” ABS-CBN, ABS-CBN Corporation, 29 Nov. 2025, www.abs-cbn.com/entertainment/showbiz/celebrities/2025/11/29/ejae-reveals-why-she-never-debuted-with-sm-entertainment-despite-being-a-K-pop-trainee-for-12-years-1013.
This news article discusses the origins and rise of South Korean singer-songwriter Kim Eun-jae, known professionally as Ejae. It discusses how Kim was in idol training for over 10 years with SM Entertainment, a Korean entertainment company. However, she did not debut with a group due to her deeper voice and her height. She did not fit SM’s rigid criterion to debut, and was terminated as a result. She went on to focus on songwriting and music production, becoming a successful songwriter for K-pop groups such as Red Velvet and aespa, before becoming a global phenomenon with the wildly successful KPop Demon Hunters movie.
This source is useful because it features direct quotes from Kim. She describes her own experiences of being depressed following her rejection, but states that she understood SM’s decision not to debut her. Direct quotes from Kim give the article more credibility.
I plan to use this as an example of the rigorous standards that production companies, like SM, look for in potential idols. It also shines a light on how these companies might stifle creativity, as someone they rejected became a global sensation without them.
Kang, Maggie and Chris Appelhans, directors. KPop Demon Hunters. Netflix, Sony Pictures Animation, 20 June 2025, https://www.netflix.com/title/81498621. Accessed 24 Jan. 2026.
KPop Demon Hunters is a 2025 animated Netflix film. The plot follows a fictional, world-famous K-pop girl group known as Huntr/x, who secretly operate as demon hunters. They protect the world from these demons by using the power of their songs. Conflict arises when the demons send a rival boy band to compete with Huntr/x and steal their fans.
Despite being seen by many as a children’s movie, the movie was extremely successful and is considered by many to be a cultural phenomenon. Songs from the fictional bands of the movie, such as “Golden” and “Soda Pop”, have seen massive commercial success. Furthermore, the movie's themes of learning to love yourself and the importance of friendship have resonated with fans around the world.
The movie also provides both praise and critique of the K-pop industry, and I plan to connect this with the other academic sources in this essay to strengthen my points. The movie illustrates situations that are very common in the industry, such as parasocial fans and stereotypes of groups. In summary, the movie presents very real issues that idols face and does a good job of visualizing these problems.
Mu, Yunfei. “Exploration of the Marketing Strategies of K-pop Industry in Communication Based on Fan Economy.” Communications in Humanities Research, vol. 75, no. 1, Aug. 2025, pp. 73–80. Crossref, https://doi.org/10.54254/2753-7064/2025.ht26209.
This paper discusses the role of the fan economy in K-pop and how companies exploit it. It also discusses idol marketing strategies, which work to strengthen attachment to the idols as much as possible in order to increase profits. The author questioned fans of K-pop group Itzy in order to see what fans are spending their money on and how attention is being spread among group members.
A weakness of this argument is that it seems to primarily sample Chinese fans. This can be assumed as the fans used for the study were found primarily using Chinese apps, such as Rednote, Weibo, and WeChat. This may weaken the arguments made in the paper, as Chinese fans may have a different fan culture compared to other countries. It would have been better if users from other platforms, such as Instagram or X, were also sampled in order to gain a better understanding of all fans, and not just those from China.
I plan to use this paper as an explanation of some of the strategies that music companies use to extract the most money from fans. It gives a good argument for the extreme monetization of the genre.
Saeji, CedarBough T., et al. “Regulating the Idol: The Life and Death of a South Korean Popular Music Star.” Asia-Pacific Journal, vol. 16, no. 14, July 2018. Crossref, https://doi.org/10.1017/s1557466018014481.
The article covers the suicide of K-pop idol Kim Jong-hyun, more commonly known as Jonghyun, of the boy band Shinee, and uses his death as an example of the extreme expectations and pressures placed on idols. The authors identify South Korea’s intense societal pressures, lack of attention to overall mental and physical well-being, and South Korea’s extreme celebrity culture as key factors in Kim’s suicide.
The article is effective in conveying its message as it goes over every aspect that could have contributed to Kim’s suicide. For example, not only does the article examine Kim’s life as an idol, but it also examines the underlying stigmas against mental health that are prevalent in Korea. Furthermore, the authors make sure to emphasize that Kim’s death was not caused by a single factor, but by the combined stress of his chronic depression, his intense life as an idol, and the intense South Korean social climate.
In my project, this source is useful in that it shows that the idol system has real costs and that the issues with it are systemic and heavily connected to the comparably harsh culture of South Korea. All in all, it provides evidence that the system that makes K-pop so profitable and emotional is the same one that is generating heavy psychological stress and causing real harm.
Souders, Avery J. “The New Pied Pipers: The Globalization of K-pop and the Role of Parasocial Relationships”. 2022. ProQuest Dissertations & Theses.
The paper discusses how K-pop became a global phenomenon by focusing on globalization, cultural hybridization, and parasocial relationships between idols and fans. It also argues that K-pop’s rise was not a matter of luck, but something that was engineered and meant to happen. The paper ultimately argues that emotional attachment is amplified through company marketing tactics, and that this affects people worldwide due to increasing globalization and cultural hybridization.
This paper is effective in that it has a very large amount of supporting evidence. It analyzed hundreds of comments made on a variety of platforms in order to find a pattern of behavior among fans. The sheer amount of comments makes the paper’s claims easy to support and provides the author with more credibility.
I plan to use this source as evidence of parasocial relationships and the importance they play in the profitability of K-pop. The paper explains that parasocial relationships are a money-making machine and provides examples of the behavior. This will be very useful in explaining how the relationship between the fans and the idols makes money.
Wang, Zhaoqi. ‘Research on Korean Idol-Making Industry Based on Culture Industry Theory’. Proceedings of the 2022 6th International Seminar on Education, Management and Social Sciences (ISEMSS 2022), Atlantis Press, 2022, pp. 3365–3372, https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-494069-31-2_395.
This paper analyzes the Korean idol-making process through the lens of Theodor W. Adorno’s cultural industry theory, arguing that K-pop is a highly industrialized system that mass-produces idols and uses them as cultural commodities rather than as independent artists. Furthermore, the paper also argues that the industry exploits fans by encouraging heavy emotional and financial investment. Finally, the author claims that the idol industry also has negative social consequences, specifically as it promotes consumerism and “anti-enlightenment” ideas.
A weakness of this argument is that it relies entirely on Adorno’s culture industry theory, which is inherently skeptical of capitalism and mass culture. As a result, the paper automatically assumes that capitalism and mass culture are harmful and does not give consideration to alternative perspectives, such as the potential for capitalism to encourage creativity and cultural exchange as seen in countries like the United States.
However, this source is useful in that it gives a good understanding of some of the more negative aspects of the industry. For example, it discusses how the idols are standardized and made from “pseudo-individualism.” This can go in the paper as evidence of how the industry’s factory-like running affects its performers, as they are often molded into their roles rather than being themselves.