“As we write this, we regret to notify you that we may not be able to order as many books as we had anticipated,” a tweet from August 31 says. “As some of you may know, we’ve run across some unforeseen roadblocks due to stricter fan club rules.”
The post was uploaded by the account @LISABar CN, or Lisa Bar, the first and largest fan club dedicated to Blackpink’s Lisa in China.
Following a government crackdown on both general entertainment and, in particular, pop idol culture, the statement mirrors rising shifts in Chinese fandom communities. As local fanbase spaces become less able to support their favorite South Korean-based singers, the repercussions for the K-pop business might be tremendous.
Lisa Bar’s administrator expressed regrets about Chinese fans not being able to support their favorite star as much as they would have liked – fans can now only buy an album once, whereas previously, many would have bought the same album multiple times to help their favorite idols or groups post higher sales – and hinted at the impact on Chinese fan spaces in larger international K-pop communities in a four-tweet thread.
FANS SAID: “We apologize since we had high expectations for ourselves to do our best for Lisa, but we must follow the rules set down for fans. We hope that everyone can do their best and that we can all work together to achieve our goals.” It’s all about Lisa. “We, as Chinese fans, have taken on the role of being the fan organizations on whom overseas fans can rely, but we didn’t anticipate letting you down at any point. We apologize for the inconvenience and hope that you will all be able to work diligently for us at this time.”
Source:scmp-com
