Dear Japan - There are reasons why K-pop is breaking big internationally and J-pop is not

[koganbot]

Added this to my Oral Hygiene post after YouTube yanked the Japanese video I'd embedded for Hara's "Secret Love." (Goo Hara is one of the singers in K-pop band Kara, who are massively popular in Japan as well as Korea and gear some of their material especially for Japan.) Fortunately, I found another full version of the Japanese PV,* and that's up

Comments

[askbask]

Risk and reward consideration I guess, as the Japanese physical market is better than anywhere else, although album sales are at risk there as well, and the physical singles include videos, and there are often various editions of a single or album with differing content, and maybe international attention doesn't pay a much as an expensive single purchase. I'm buying Japanese albums in Korean stores and they are considerably cheaper than they are in Japan.

It used to be impossible, now it's semi-possible to find J-pop MVs on youtube. AKB48 even offer subtitles in various languages, only the videos are generally posted in full only after the singles are old news and no longer contending for the top of the chart.

At least all Momoiro Clover Z PVs are uploaded in full from day one.

Meanwhile Perfume made a very deliberate statement of going global, releasing a global compilation, opening up their official fan club globally, doing an Asian tour, but their own channel still mostly only gives us 1.xx long versions of their MV filmography. To be fair, they seem to have stopped removing others' uploads of videos completely, so I can find several glorious HD versions of 'Glitter' there.

For those who do upload videos, through their own channel or a VEVO-ized channel, too often they're 480p at max. Utada's amazing filmography is up in full, but only at that resolution.

One of my favorite Japanese artist of the year, the underselling rnb singer JASMINE, seems to have no official presence at all. I had been enjoying an unofficial upload of her 'Only You' video for months but it was gone this week and I had to resort to a very poor quality Chinese upload to find it _at all_.

Her songs are still there, though.

[koganbot]

"This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Sony Music Japan International Inc."