Paparazzi, red carpet interviews, and curated Instagram feeds are the main glimpses fans get of A-list celebrities in Western countries. This mysterious aura keeps people wondering what might really be going on behind the glitz and the glamour. While these stars may still attract obsessive fans, many work hard to keep their personal lives behind a curtain away from the public.
On the other side of the world, the K-pop industry manages fan interactions in a completely different way. Instead of curating a mysterious persona, they feed into parasocial relationships via online platforms like Weverse, V Live, and Bubble. 📸
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Before the K-pop company HYBE that owns Weverse acquired V Live in 2022, both were widely used platforms by fans. Before the acquisition, V Live was a free platform where K-pop groups could go on live streams, while fans could interact with them and each other through the live chat during the stream (much like Twitch). Weverse, on the other hand, was a social media platform exclusively for HYBE groups like BTS.
Now that the two have merged, Weverse has become a major platform for all K-pop artists. Even some Western celebrities have created communities on it to reach global fans, including Ariana Grande, Megan Thee Stallion, and 2hollis. The acquisition has led to Weverse’s transformation into both a combined social media and popular live-streaming platform.
These livestreams make fans feel like they are on a real video call with their idols, and are getting insights into their real lives offstage. During these streams, idols are also encouraged to do interactive things with fans, like asking viewers questions and answering questions in the live chat as well. For example, a popular question that fans will ask is, “What is your TMI for today?” These “TMIs” are usually just tidbits of information about an idol’s day like what they ate for breakfast or a slightly embarrassing story. However, these small interactions make fans feel like they are getting to know the personal details about their favorite artists’ lives.
KATSEYE’s Weverse Live
Bubble, on the other hand, is a chatting platform created by SM Entertainment that fans pay a monthly subscription for. In return, they get exclusive content from their favorite artists, including messages, pictures, videos, and audio recordings. Fans also get to send messages — with some limitations.
According to Mashable, “You can also send messages to that artist, but are limited to three at a time and a character count corresponding to how long you've been on the app: 30 characters for the first 49 days, 50 characters after, and so on”. From the artists’ side of the platform, it is a giant group chat with all the fans, so anything they send, goes out to all subscribers. However, from the fans’ side, the platform looks like a private chatroom between the artist and fan, so other fans’ messages are hidden.
The platform feeds into the parasocial dynamics between idols and fans by making it seem like artists are personally messaging the user. An article by Lillian Yang on Nielson Norman Group’s site details the UI on Bubble, including how it is very similar to KakaoTalk, the top messaging app in Korea.
For example, KakaoTalk displays the number of people who haven’t read a message by showing a “1” in a direct message (DM) chat until the recipient opens it. Bubble mimics this — showing a “1” next to a fan’s message when the artist has not “seen” it yet, even though there’s no actual guarantee they read it. However, the simple disappearance of that “1” creates a powerful illusion of genuine interaction.
“In both Bubble (left) and Kakao Talk (right), the number 1 appeared to the left of each message, marking it as unread until it was “seen” by the conversation partner.” — Lillian Yang on NNGroup