I remember the New Yorker deep dive writeup on Kpop a few years back, and how the industry executives who run kpop consider it a product of a “cultural technology” formula. They screen hundreds of teens for specific ‘look’ and appearances, add beats, add some suggestive dance and lyrics, and out comes another boy or girl band. Exoticism sells in any era, especially with a generous dash of sexuality.

True. There are various things to like about Japanese. Their literature — including Chinese, Korean — gives you a different philosophical and life perspective. However, the thing that I dislike about Japanese is the sexualization of young girls — whom they call “lolis” — and condoning of perverts. I hope they reform their literature; otherwise, their society is fascinating with their blending of Shinto and Buddhism. They appear to me to be practically Hindus (even have Hindu origin gods and Sanskrit based scriptures) with a desire to be meritocratic.

Japanese have been into young female singers for ages, before they had a rapidly aging society and very low birthrates. It’s not about that. And it’s not like Kpop idols are much older. In fact the birth rate in Japan is considerably higher than in S Korea now, and you literally have people extolling Japanese for their high birth rates compared to the rest of developed Asia. S Korea is the lowest in the world, a TFR lower than 1.0 for 2 years running. Whatever happened in Japan in terms of a stagnant economy and culture is going to hit S Korea like a ton of bricks in about 10 years, without Japan’s enormous accumulated wealth circa 2000 to cushion the blow.

True. Korean girls look better than Japanese girls; could be because of plastic surgery. The other reason is that Koreans are like chameleons; they start following any dominant culture that they encounter; Indian, Chinese, Japanese to American culture, their society has changed its culture countless times. Furthermore, Koreans are extremely money and status minded — probably the topmost in this regard in the whole world. Their aping American culture and subsequent success in Kpop is due to this — as I understand.

In addition, Japanese beauty standards are very different as they have a rampant teen fetish due to rapidly aging society.

1 reason is that back in the early 2000s when Kpop was getting started internationally, the domestic Korean music market was quite small, while the Japanese market was absolutely enormous. People still bought CDs in large numbers in Japan, and I think there were a few years when the Japanese market was actually larger than the US market. So while Koreans were making a push overseas into the rest of Asia, Japanese made no effort whatsoever. Why go after Thailand if the Japanese market is like 100 times bigger? Well now the Japanese market is not so big anymore, and shrinking every year, and it’s too little too late to try to beat Kpop especially in Asia.

The other main reason is beauty standards. Japanese like a “cute” girl/boy next door look, while Koreans go for impossible cosmetic surgery assisted good looks. It turns out the Korean way is more popular, to an extent even in Japan. Also, Jpop has kind of an amateurish feel to it compared to Kpop. There’s a production company oligopoly in Japan that’s been sitting on their huge market and making no effort for decades now. Meanwhile Koreans worked hard, got good at making slick music videos on the cheap, and the artists trained (especially at dancing) like crazy.

There is a reason why I — and a lot of people — started disliking Japanese literature. The biggest reason is:

Beta male personality of Japanese MC

You can only read so much of MC being a doormat for everyone. The minority literature that has a normal MC are gems.

Also, the reason Jpop is not so popular is that it is centered more towards Karaoke. That is why it is mostly limited to Japan. Do watch Hotel Del Luna; its storyline is amazing — a serial worth seeing again and again. I watched it on English subtitles.

Kpop came of age during a time of absolutely rampant music piracy in S Korea and Asia, so they used music videos truly as promotional videos, to get hype around the artist and get people to buy concert tickets, which is where they made their money. And so the production companies and even the fans got really good at gaming billboard and youtube rankings, more so than even American artists do. I mean there are definitely Kpop fans in America, and the fans that exist are really into it, but I think just looking at billboard rankings or youtube views will exaggerate the popularity.

Hotel Del Luna

I have also read scores of translated Chinese, Korean, Japanese manga, animes, Light novels, etc. for at least a decade. At this point, I can even tell how authors of different SEA cultures write their stories. +? for being a pro in wasting time.