"Couple hundred" is literally wrong, though. I sold maybe 100 copies of their Alive album myself as small, local kpop merch seller. They sold out tours, here, with American fans, not fans traveling from Asia. If you weren't a fan back then, don't lie on us. https://twitter.com/jan_ro/status/1312568365400158214

You have to understand, the way Billboard was counted was through offical local sales like Target or iTunes. BIGBANG never sold physical albums in the US. And back then, kpop fans focused on buying physical albums from Korea to boost Korean charts. There used to be fanwars-

- where people would complain that fans bought boxes and boxes of albums to boost chart positions.

Back then, I don't think even YouTube views and shit helped with Billboard, like it does now. And BIGBANG only got on Spotify a couple years ago, while they were all in the army.

It's extremely weird that BTS fans do this. I became a kpop fan in 2007. In the US. Through other American kpop fans.
We had kcon, SMTown, YG Family concerts, and then individual bands went on tours locally. I saw 2NE1, BIGBANG, Block B and Shinee. It happened.

You can't erase 10 years of my life just because it pains you to admit kpop was a thing here before BTS got big. You can't delete my stacks of kpop albums, my merch, my light sticks, the old ipod I have full of playlists.

I'm legitimately glad kids like BTS, but what is this need to pretend American kids didn't like Super Junior and SHINee and especially BIGBANG to prove that BTS is popular.

Dude, we did. It happened. We lived it. You can't erase it just because of stupid ass fanwar.

It's weird as hell because I'm not really into kpop anymore, but I can't even relate to these people because if I say "oh, yeah, I used to be into kpop!" They get excited for a second until I say I was a VIP. Then they get all defensive about BTS. And they start saying that shit.

Like... literally, BIGBANG was the biggest kpop band, and was huge all over the world. It's true. BTS is bigger NOW, but at one point, they had thousands of fans outside their hotel in Brasil singing Blue. They're the first kpop band to win an international award. It's true.

It's so weird. It's like Drake fans being mad that you said Will Smith won the first rap Grammy. One doesn't take anything away from the other.

What is this need to belittle 2nd generation kpop groups? There's a reason these people are so rich and it's not because they

were "only popular in Korea".

Which is an idiotic thing to believe, like kpop groups haven't been promoting in Japan for 20 years, and aren't usually extremely popular in the Philippines and Malaysia and South America...

Also, this is mostly a problem with non-Asian kpop fans. They think tearing down other kpop legacies to boost BTS or whoever they stan is a good thing to do. It's really baffling. It's awesome that these young Asian groups found success around the world and erasing it is weird af

It doesn't actually make BTS look better or stronger. It just comes across as slightly racist. Like you refuse to believe any other Korean group could have ever been liked or celebrated for their merits. Like being "kpop" is somehow negative. It's really fetish-like.

Also, in the sense that it's like you don't want any other Korean artists to achieve international success. Like you think there's only room for one successful Korean group.
It's weird af. BIGBANG'S success doesn't negate BTS's success. Black Pink's success doesn't.

Let other Asian recording artists be great. Stop belittling legacies that carne before BTS. When I started stanning kpop, the big legacy group was DBSK. I never once thought I needed to tear them down to stan my idols. DBSK had the Guinness World Record for biggest fan club.

Which was before BIGBANG was even the biggest kpop group. So if DBSK set a Guinness World Record in like 2006, how can it be true that no kpop groups had any impact until BTS? It's simply NOT true.

Since everyone found this thread, hi! My first kpop group was actually Wonder Girls, and then Super Junior and then BIGBANG. I used to stan A LOT of groups, but I ended up mostly being a VIP, a Blackjack, and a Shawol. Nice to meet y'all!