In a huge studio outside seoul, technicians huddled in front of the screens as cartoon K-pop singers, at least one of whom had a tail, danced against a psychedelic backdrop. A woman with … magical wings walked past them.

In a way, everyone on screen was real. The singers were picked up by real people in the studio, isolated in booths, with headphones and remote controls in both hands. Immersed in a virtual world, they competed to be part of (hopefully) the next big Korean girl group.

The stakes are high. Some participants, unable to get through, fell into … seething lava.

Some say it’s the future of entertainment in the Metaverse, brought to you by South Korea, the country where everything new is tested.

“There are many who want to enter the Metaverse, but the required number of users has not yet been reached,” said Jung Yoon-hyuk, an assistant professor at the School of Media and Communications at Korea University. Elsewhere they want to try to get into the Metaverse, but you have to have good content to be successful. In Korea, this content is K-pop, according to the NYT.

In the Metaverse – whatever it is – the usual rules don’t apply. And the Korean entertainment industry is looking at opportunities with the belief that fans will happily follow suit.

K-pop groups have had virtual doppelgangers for years. Karina, a member of Aespa, can be seen chatting with her digital self, “ae-Karina”, on Youtube in a conversation reminiscent of a TV talk show.

Cyber ​​group only

The Korean company Kakao Entertainment wants to go further. He is partnering with mobile gaming company Netmarble to develop a K-pop cyber group called Mave, where four virtual members will connect with real fans around the world.

Cocoa is also behind “Girl’s Re:verse”, a K-pop show on Metaverse whose first episode was viewed on streaming platforms this month over a million times in three days. For both ventures, Kakao prepares album releases, brand endorsements, video games and digital comics, among other things.

Compared to their Korean counterparts, media companies in the United States have experimented “slightly” with Metaverse so far, according to Andrew Wallenstein, president and chief media analyst at the Variety Intelligence Platform.

Countries like South Korea are “often seen as a testing ground for how the future will unfold,” he said. AND. Wallenstein. “If any trend from abroad reaches the US, South Korea will be the first country where it starts.”

South Korean experimentation with virtual entertainment began at least 25 years ago with the short life of a virtual singer named Adam. A child of the 90s, he was a computer-drawn blindfolded creature with a husky voice that tried too hard to sound sexy. Adam disappeared from the scene after the release of one album in 1998.

Digital creations like Adam have been a hallmark of Korean pop culture for a generation. Today, Korean “virtual influencers” like Rosie and Lucy have six-figure Instagram followers, promoting big-name brands like Chevrolet and Gucci.

Influencers seem almost real, but not quite — their almost human “quality” is part of their charm,” said Baik Seung Yup, creator of Rozy.

“We want to create a new kind of content,” said Mr. Bike, who estimated that around 70% of the world’s virtual influencers are Korean.

In the first five months of 2022, more than $120 billion was spent globally to develop the Metaverse technology, according to McKinsey. Most of that amount came from companies operating in the United States, said Matthew Ball, the technology entrepreneur who wrote the book. about the Metaverse.

Investment 170 million dollars

The most extreme recent example is when Facebook renamed itself “Meta” in a multibillion-dollar bid to embrace the next digital frontier, only to see its stock plummet and profits dwindle.

The South Korean government has invested more than $170 million to create the so-called “Metaverse Alliance”, which includes hundreds of companies. Mr Ball said it was one of the most aggressive programs of its kind. So while South Korea is way ahead when it comes to virtual pop stars, the question is whether its companies can follow suit as the metaverse evolves, Ball said.

Government support for new technologies in South Korea has paid off in the past. The modern economy has been built on tech conglomerates that have won the bet on the mobile phone industry, setting the stage for what Bernie Iso, executive director of the music industry in Seoul, has called “the most wired and wireless country.”

Here, teenagers flip through comics on their phones, watch countless hours of Korean dramas without cable, and avidly follow K-pop stars on social media and new platforms. In Zepeto and Weverse, fans interact with each other, sometimes in the form of customizable avatars, and with their favorite bands.

Kakao Entertainment – a division of Kakao, a South Korean all-in-one technology company – announces Mave, its virtual unfinished group, the first K-pop group created entirely in the metaverse using machine learning, face swapping, and full 3D image generation technology. To give them a global appeal, the company wants Maeve’s “girls” to eventually be able to communicate in, say, Portuguese with a Brazilian fan, and in Chinese with someone in Taiwan, fluently and convincingly.

“No real person will ever feel alone”

The idea, according to Kang Sung-ku, the project’s technical director, is that when these virtual creatures can simulate meaningful conversations, “no real person will ever feel alone.”

Cocoa’s singing show “Girl’s Re:verse” has a familiar reality show “survival” format: 30 singers are eliminated over time until the last five form a group. But the members – all members of established K-pop groups or solo artists – compete, tease and hang out like avatars in a virtual world called “W”. Their true identities are not revealed until they leave the show (in some cases by falling into lava) or reach the end.

There are few limits to the imagination in “W”, in which the contestants take the contestants from the high seas to the Palace of Versailles and the desert landscape. One avatar is a chocolate princess born from a cocoa tree, and the other is with red devil horns. Pengsu, the popular mascot of the straight-talking penguin, is one of the judges.

The contestants participated in creating their own avatars, said Song Soo Jung, the show’s producer. The goal was to distance K-pop singers – “idols” as they’re called – from the industry’s unforgiving beauty standards, allowing them to be judged by their talent rather than their looks. (Although avatars, we should probably say that they all have big eyes and heart-shaped faces).

The show also allows them to let go of their role as a versatile character and make jokes. “Idols in the real world are expected to be perfect, but we hope that through this show, they can get rid of that pressure,” Ms. Song said.

Glitches were still being fixed on a recent recording. Support staff entered and exited the dome to help the singers operate their equipment. At least one crash made it into the first episode: “I Can’t Hear You!” one contestant screamed when the judge repeatedly asked her the same question.

But some things in reality TV have not changed. It turns out that even avatars are encouraged to blow up their competitors.

“Look at the green light,” the producer pointed into the microphone at the participant, whose avatar was looking at him from the screen. Who do you think did worse? he said. “Speak like you’re gossiping about someone.”

Source: New York Times