• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.605-616
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• 2022

Given that the current Idol fandom has been enormously affected by the development of digital technology such as the Internet, mobile or social media, this study explored how generational fandom culture has been shifted depending on the fandom's use of differential online platforms and services, i.e., online community vs. social network services. The survey results indicate that 3^rd generation fandom showed significantly greater intimacy, greater attachment/worship, greater similarity toward Idol stars as well as greater fandom loyalty and greater fandom identity than 1^st and 2^nd generation fandom. Similarly, compared to online community centered fandom, social network centered fandom showed greater intimacy, greater attachment/worship, greater similarity as well as greater fandom loyalty and identity than community-centered fandom.

• KSII Transactions on Internet and Information Systems (TIIS)
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• v.17 no.8
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• pp.2222-2240
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• 2023

Brand fandom refers to a collection of consumers with strong emotions toward a brand. Studying the dynamics of brand fandom can help brands understand which services or strategies influence their consumers to become a part of brand fandom. However, existing literature on fandom in the last three decades has mainly used qualitative methods, and there is still a lack of research on fandom using quantitative methods. Specifically, previous studies lack a framework for locating fandoms from online textual data and analyzing their dynamics. This study proposes a framework for exploring brand fandom dynamics based on online textual data. This framework consists of four phases based on the design thinking model: Preparing Data, Defining Fandom Categories, Generating Fandom Dynamics, and Analyzing Fandom Dynamics. This framework uses techniques such as social network analysis and process mining, combined with brand personality theory. We demonstrate the applicability of this framework using case studies of two Korean home appliance brands. The dataset contains 14,593 posts by consumers in 374 online communities. The results show that the proposed framework can analyze brand fandom dynamics using textual customer data. Our study contributes to the interdisciplinary research at the intersection of data-driven service design and consumer culture quantification.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.19 no.5
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• pp.296-305
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• 2019

With the growth of the Korean Wave and the importance of the fandom economy, it is necessary to consider the competitiveness of the Korean Wave with its fandom viewpoint. Particularly, the fandom phenomenon shows the characteristics of identifying the favorite star and actively acquiring and sharing related information in the fan community. Therefore, in this study, we examined the influence of Korean national image on consumers' intention to use Korean contents, and examined the mediating effects of fandom identification among Chinese, Japanese and Vietnamese consumers. As a result of the empirical analysis, cultural image, corporate image, and product image were found to have statistically significant influence on the intention to use Korean Wave contents. In addition, star identification and pan community identification showed partial mediation in the effect of cultural images on the intention to use Korean contents. The results of this study suggest that the Korean Wave is a leading factor for the continuous development of Korean Wave, not the halo effect point for improving the national image, and the mediating effect of the fandom phenomenon is tested empirically.

• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.21 no.7
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• pp.1-12
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• 2021

This study explored the mechanism by which stars and fans build a global fandom community based on social connectivity of social media based on BTS' official Twitter and in-depth interviews with Chinese, American, and Korean fans. Stars and fans use the connectivity of social media to build a pseudo-private relationship that crosses public and private affairs. Even though they won the award, BTS "congratulates" the fan club, ARMY, and organizes a dialogue method so that each fan becomes the subject. From a fan's point of view, it comes to be seen as a personal message to them, which is not just applied to the text composition method. On days when there is no public message such as official activities or anniversaries, a device to communicate without missing a day has been prepared by raising private messages or previous memories. It was found that the sense of constant connection strengthens fans' sense of community toward each other.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.14 no.9
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• pp.349-358
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• 2016

The purposes of the study are to examine the relationship amongst adolescents' internet usage, fandom activities, sense of community and their mental health in the digital era and to probe into the effect of internet usage, fandom activities, sense of community on adolescents' mental health. The results are as follows: First, there were statistically significant correlations among those four factors. Secondly, it shows that the effect of internet usage, fandom activities and sense of community on the adolescents' mental health have a difference by gender. In the case of female adolescents, there is no effect of internet usage on their mental health. But, the study reveals that adolescents' internet usage and fandom activities which now are accepted as a part of their culture, could be combined with the sense of community and could have an effect on the adolescents' mental health. Furthermore, the study casts a light on the possibility to build a strong point on adolescents' activities, education, counseling and policy making for the purpose to enhance adolescents' mental health in the future.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.14 no.5
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• pp.2121-2130
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• 2013

Based on the case study methods, the study analyzes that the countless UCC Cloud cloud is the niche creation by the lead users make process. This research show as follows. First, The Drama lovers and fan fiction writers are not only drama consumers but UCC creators/producers. By the process that the UCC and fan fiction is tailored to meet the needs of their users create fan fiction in fandom community, they create an entirely different niche from original drama. Second, the flow(drama consumption/evaluation, viewers needs/adaption, the user's creation/production) which community's creative users make sequentially coevolutes with the flow(drama information offer, intentionally supply/diffusion, derivatives production) of media companies. Third, the drama fandom community activities which is non-commercial activities form the drama ecosystem with a new paradigm, as well as form a virtuous cycle inked to the market continuously beyond fun, play, empathy.

• Fashion & Textile Research Journal
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• v.23 no.5
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• pp.559-575
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• 2021

The popularity of K-pop, the development of diverse media and communications, and rapid globalization are increasing consumers' attachment to celebrities. These celebrities, called "Human brand", have a growing impact on consumers. However, research on idol celebrities has been conducted mainly on teenagers. Furthermore, there are limits to the studies on consumers' attachment to idol celebrities who do not advertise specific products and intention to purchase products which are not advertised but related to the idol human brand. Therefore, this study has been conducted on 301 out of 400 adult women in their twenties to forties in Korea to examine the relationship between the characteristics of the idol human brand, attachment to the idol human brand, desire to imitate the idol human brand, desire to identify with the idol human brand and its fandom community, and the effect on purchase intention. For the statistical analysis, SPSS and AMOS were used. The study found that the characteristics of the idol human brand which are trust, professionality, social attractiveness, and physical attractiveness positively influenced attachment to the idol human brand. The attachment to the idol human brand positively affected the imitation desire toward the idol human brand, and the identification desire with the idol human brand, and to identify with its fandom community. Additionally, the desire to imitate and to identify with the idol human brand and its fandom community positively affected the intention. Furthermore, the relationships between all variables were found to have a significant mediating effect.

• Journal of Digital Convergence
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• v.17 no.11
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• pp.523-530
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• 2019

This study examines how global fandom for Korean dramas is formed and maintained by examining the reason and purpose of voluntarily making the subtitles of Korean drama through in-depth email interviews with foreign subtitle producers(fan subber) working on a video site called Viki.com. The research focused on Viki's fan community, which has grown into the most influential Korean Wave platform. Collective intelligence expresses in the fan community produces more than professional results and they are acting as consumers, cultural producers, and second creators of K-content. In order to continue the spread of K-content, it needs to pay more attention to the long-term strategy of global fandom combined with the fan community activities of the new media platform and network effects.

• Proceedings of the Korea Contents Association Conference
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• 2014.06a
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• pp.131-132
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• 2014

• Journal of Korea Entertainment Industry Association
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.1-14
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• 2020

This study was initiated by the interest in identifying what the characteristics of BTS' preference is in the expanded K-Pop market. For this study, a survey was conducted to Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, and Korea where BTS is popular. The results of this study show that Vietnam and Thailand have the most positive perceptions of most of the BTS preferences, and the factors affecting the highest quality were analyzed by the differentiating sense of BTS. BTS' preference is an independent variable consisting of five factors: singers and music, a discriminative sense, global communication, meditative lyrics and Korean sentiment. And it has been shown to have a statistically significant influence on both the fandom star and the fan community at a high level. In particular, the Identification desire for fandom star shows that the discriminative sense and meditative lyrics affect the positive at a high level. Also, the identification desire for the fan community's found that the attraction of singers and music affects the highest level of affection. This study was extended to Southeast Asian and Korean fans through a wide range of survey participants, and it is meaningful that a new perspective on the BTS preference was available. Nonetheless, Failure to take into account the various variables that may affect the fandom effect and the intent to purchase, and the lack of a survey of fans in the U.S. and Europe, which has more fans worldwide, could be a limitation of the study.