On August 7th, KBS aired a “dream girls summer special” for their sports variety show, ‘Dream Team 2‘, which contained some suggestive and licentious scenes that left viewers feeling uncomfortable.

Girl group members from SISTAR, Rainbow, CSJH, Girl’s Day, Nine Muses, Dal Shabet, Rania, together with Lee Pani, Kim Mi Yeon, Kim Na Young, Kang Eun Bi, etc guested on the show for what was supposed to be a fun series of games.

Since the recording for this particular episode happened in a waterpark, female contestants wore T-shirts over their bathing suits, but not all did. Some of the matches also called for inappropriate scenes that made viewers watching with their families feel rather uncomfortable.

The scenes in question would be repeated on end, and cameras would even zoom up to specific body parts, providing one-shots to the celebrities with the best bodies. This issue was compounded by the fact that the program was aired during a time slot when families gathered to watch TV together.

Soon after the broadcast, the viewer board for ‘Dream Team 2′ was met with an onslaught of angry viewers who left comments like, “It was as if I was watching an old adult’s program”, and “Cameras would take shots from the front and even one-shots of the contestants’ breasts. It was just embarrassing.”

Other viewers, however, defended the program by commenting, “It was a refreshing broadcast fit for the summer weather. I felt as if I had gone on vacation myself”, and “This is reverse discrimination. It’s apparently fine when guys run around with their tops off, but it’s suddenly sexually suggestive for girls to wear t-shirts over their bikinis?”

Source + Photos: X Sports News via Nate

On July 22nd, the Korean Culture and Information Service of the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism revealed that SM Entertainment’s producer, Lee Soo Man, had donated a total of $100,000 USD to the Le Centre Culturel Coréen.  

Le Centre Culturel Coréen was established in 1980 to raise awareness of Korean culture to the French public and to promote and develop artistic exchanges between Korea and France.

Lee was previously chosen as the promotional advertisement model for KB, an investment security company, and recently finished up his filming with the brand. 

With the income earned from the CF, Lee gave a portion of it to the celebrities in his agency, as an act of encouragement, and donated the rest to Le Centre Culturel Coréen.

Lee said, “The ‘SM Town Live‘ concerts held for two days in June garnered great success and raised awareness for not only the music of our artists, but for Korean culture overall in Europe. I decided to donate to the organization to further aid and support their efforts in spreading Korean culture in Europe.”

A representative of the the Korean Culture and Information Service said, “Lee’s donation will go through evaluation by the donation committee to make use of its full purpose.”

Source + Photos: AJ News, Korean Culture official website

Although YG Entertainment opened up their new building back in 2010, its inner workings remained a mystery to many fans.

Pictures of the new edifice were revealed via an online community under the title, “YG Entertainment’s newly constructed building“. Netizens got to see that the fun image attached to the YG Entertainment brand doesn’t just stop with their artists – it can be seen in the practice studios, hallways, and offices.

Upon seeing the pictures, netizens comment with, “I’m so jealous of the celebrities within the agency“, “I wonder what the structure of the building represents“, “I heard that on the stair wall, there’s a huge flatscreen that’s constantly playing music videos“.

Source: Dong-A Daily via Nate

Recent photos of JYJ’s Junsu shopping at high-end store ‘L’inoui‘ was posted online.

Dressed comfortably in a red checkered shirt and black pants, the singer topped his outfit with some key point sunglasses.

According to a ‘L’inoui” employee, Junsu visited the store with a friend and shopped around looking to purchase an item. He was looking in particular for a new popular backpack while also trying out a number of different styles of backpacks.

Other celebrities who have been seen sporting ‘L’inoui’ merchandise include Jang Dong Gun, Hyunbin, Kim Namgil, Ha Jiwon and others.

The Bono canvas beige backpack that Junsu ended up choosing has also been spotted on Super Junior’s Choi Siwon, 2PM’s Nichkhun, Kim Soohyun among other idol stars, helping its rise to become the new “must-have” bag. The bag retails for 498,000 won or around $470 USD.

Source & Photo: Newsen via Nate

It’s been just two months since Jinyoung, Shinwoo, Sandeul, Baro, and Gongchan made their debut. After soaring high with their debut track ‘O.K.’, B1A4 has started activities with their follow-up ballad number, ‘Only Learned the Bad Things’.

How did these flower boys get together to form one group?

According to rapper Baro, he joined the group after his company saw a photo of him on his friend’s Cyworld page. At the audition, Baro had sung Jo Soo Mi’s ‘Once I Leave’ and Sung Si Kyung’s ‘The Path Leading to Me’. Because he enjoyed hip-hop, he’d also showed off his rapping and beat-boxing, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Leader Jinyoung had continuously admired the world of the celebrities and singers since he was young, and was also casted into his current company after his photo was spotted on Cyworld. Jinyoung had auditioned with the portrayal of character ‘Gong-gil’ from movie “Man of the King“. He can also act, having some experience in the field of dramas.

Maknae Gongchan was the third member to be contacted thanks to Cyworld, but it turns out that he won the site’s ‘Uljjang Challenge’ event when he was in middle school. Gongchan’s beauty also earned him a runner-up position in a cross-dressing contest after he performed a dance of Ivy’s.

Main vocal Sandeul originates from Busan, and prepared to become a singer by going to various singing competitions. His agency approached him during a talent show after Sandeul delivered a stirring performance of a ballad song from Kim Yun Woo.

Shinwoo, who has the role of both vocals and rap, was inspired by his musical family. There is a trot singer in his family, and one of his noonas tackled traditional Korean singing as well. He decided to participate in a teenage singing contest one day, which proved to be fateful after he cracked a smile on-stage. A company associate attending the event fell head-over-heels over that smile and contacted him, resulting in his enlistment with B1A4.

B1A4 all originate from the countryside, earning them the nickname ‘country-dol’. Jinyoung and Shinwoo are from Choongbook, Cheongju; Sandeul from Kyungnam, Busan; Baro from Junnam, Kwangju; and finally Gongchun came from Junnam, Soonchun. Jinyoung had been counted as the number 1 attendee for any talent shows or festivals during his school days. Saying that he loved to go out in front of people since he was young, Jinyoung had a mischievous but bright and cheery smile, and was a popular student who partook as a grade representative as well.

Shinwoo had participated in the school’s band club, and was a child who loved music, even going to perform in Hongdae at times. Contrasting from his gentle image now, Shinwoo – who says he liked rock and did rough music then – makes people around him smile by saying, “During school, I didn’t ‘know’ smiling, but people say that my smile’s pretty and that I should smile a lot now.”

Sandeul had also become famous by having a singing battle among his musical friends. Everyone had been surprised because they only knew him as a child who liked music. Sandeul mused, “My mother was from a choir, so she gave me advice that when I sing, I shouldn’t imitate another person but to do my own type of singing. I engraved that advice into my heart.”

Bright Baro also was an active and extroverted type of person since he was young. Aside from becoming the grade president just one week after transferring schools, he also has the experience of emceeing a festival and participating in a comedy club during high school.

Having lived and worked hard in their respective homes, these members all flocked to Seoul and made their singing debut after undergoing two years of training. There are many children who wish to become singers, but it isn’t easy to come to debut. The homesickness they sometimes felt was smoothed over by their aspirations to become a singer and by each other’s company.

B1A4, who picks ‘familiarity’ as their charm without hesitation, said that they wanted to approach us like a neighborhood oppa or a school friend, and requested for people to watch their progress well.

Source & Photo: Newsen via Nate

On June 11th, B2ST’s Yoseob dismissed the various rumors about his relationship status, as circulated by his fans.

In a lengthy message to his fans, the star wrote:

“A lot of people are curious about this, so I’ll say it directly. I was joking when I mentioned a girlfriend on ‘Immortal Song 2.’ And please, just skip all the rumors about me and other celebrities, please… Like I said before, why can’t you believe in just what we say? 

Why do you believe these rumors and hurt us by telling us that you’re going to turn your backs to us and that you’re disappointed…?

Other people may call me petty for listening to this and that and answering to it all, but I feel that I have to clarify this misunderstanding between B2STs and B2UTYs, so I’m writing this out letter-by-letter with much difficulty.

First of all… There’s a rumor that I have a girlfriend.. That is not the truth at all.. I don’t know where this rumor first began, so I’m not able to say in detail why it’s wrong… It’s both upsetting and disappointing that I have to clarify myself like this.

I don’t know what else to say so I’m just writing and erasing… I’ll just end it here.”

Source + Photos: OSEN via Naver

As one of the top three entertainment companies in Korea, YG Entertainment has passed screening to go public on the KOSDAQ (Korea Securities Dealers Automated Quotations), a Korean stock market exchange equivalent of America’s NASDAQ. YG will be the 2nd entertainment company to qualify to be listed on the stock market, following SM Entertainment.

YG Entertainment passed the Stock Exchange Commission’s screening to go public on the KOSDAQ. The stock price is anticipated to be set around 24,600~28,800 WON (around $22 – $26 USD with a face value of 500 WON). Around 35 billion won (around $33 million USD) will be up for trade on the initial public offering.

For those of you with a keen memory, YG failed their initial screening process to be listed on the KOSDAQ in the 4th quarter of last year and applied for the process once again in under a year, successfully qualifying this go around with risen share prices.

With 2NE1 and Big Bang sweeping the charts and topping album sales, along with the total views of all YG related videos on Youtube hitting over 400 million (as of May 6th), YG Entertainment’s explosive sensation overseas was a key factor in their success.

Having top idols groups such as Big Bang and 2NE1, along with, Se7en, Psy, Gummy, and many other star musicians, YG Entertainment is a blue chip company as their sales in 2010 is estimated to be around 44.8 billion won (around $44 million USD), with 10 billion won (around $10 million USD) being net profit.

YG Entertainment’s future seems smooth, as well. Starting this year, Big Bang and 2NE1 will be expanding from the Korean scene to Japan and the U.S., leading the Hallyu wave. YG will also be breaking their operating system of producing only few elite trainees and expand their horizon as they have signed contracts with Kang Seung Yoon from “Superstar K2″.

YG Entertainment also has a good history of never having any conflict regarding contract disputes with their celebrities. Top celebrities Big Bang and Se7en have extended their contract for an additional 5 years without raising any issues. This leads back to founder Yang Hyun-Seok’s business philosophy of putting the future and priority on the artists’ before the company.

In an interview with OSEN, founder Yang Hyun-Seok explained, “I’ve had countless offers to sell shares of my company through a backdoor listing, but I pushed them all away. I have no intention whatsoever of making profit through the stock market. My reason to have YG Entertainment listed publicly is because I accepted the management’s advice to make YG a transparent and global company“.

Another plus is that YG has always lead in philanthropy and good works. YG was the first Korean entertainment company to donate 500 million won (around $500,000) to Japan’s earthquake cause. YG entertainment has caught attention because they donated a large sum of money to Japan despite the fact that their artists’ promotion in Japan have been delayed due to the earthquake.

Source + Photo: OSEN via Nate

On SBS’s program “Strong Heart”, Super Junior’s Kim Heechul revealed some very interesting insight his love life.

Heechul stated that his relationship experiences are different from what most people believe. Even though it may be disappointing, he revealed apologetically that after debuting, he had indeed dated other celebrities. However, he also revealed that he always ended up being dumped after asking, “Do you really like me?”

His close friend, Lee Young Ah explained this further by saying, “Heechul tends to act better around casual friends than around someone he really likes.”

Kim Heechul said, “I’m shy and when my girlfriend gets angry, I just kiss her. When I want to purchase a gift, I secretly worry about it a lot, but once I meet her, I just say, ‘Here, take this,’ and toss it at her.”

Heechul was asked if he would let someone go coolly if she wanted to break up with him and he replied, “I would have to. I wouldn’t want to, but I can’t hold onto her.” He continued by saying, “Sulli is 11 years younger than I am, but she asked me, ‘It’s good as long as I don’t date a guy like you, right?’”

He continued, “In 2010, while I was dating a celebrity, I realized that if a scandal were to start, it would do more damage to her than to me so I decided that I would have to protect her. That is why I met with the CEO and Media Public Relations for early consultation. I asked them to say that I followed her around if any news about us started. For that relationship, I did not pay her enough attention. If she contacted me saying that she missed me, I said that I was in a meeting and ignored her. I am currently single, but if I were to date again, I don’t know how I should behave so that we could meet each other.”

Super Junior member Shindong stated, “I think women believe that they can change Kim Heechul so they work hard for 3 months then dump him when there’s no progress,” causing laughter in the show.

Source: Nate

Netizens are buzzing over a picture of IU that was uploaded onto the website of a facial plastic surgery clinic.

Noting that the clinic specializes in jaw surgery, netizens wondered whether the picture was taken after she had undergone surgery herself. After all, it’s normal for celebrities to pose for a picture with doctors if they get sponsorships from their clinics.

The speculation led Loen Entertainment to clarify the matter through TV Daily on May 20th. They stated, “Rumors of her getting jaw surgery are completely unfounded. The clinic pictured in the photo does specialize in jaw surgery, but they also do dermatology as well. IU went to the clinic once or twice in 2009 for skin care, but she hasn’t returned since. It’s weird that people think that she automatically received surgery because she took a picture in a clinic. There are pictures of other celebrities with that clinic and we’re gravely upset that it’s only IU who received such rumors.”

They continued, “We would just like to thank everyone for their interest in IU, but as she is still young, we ask that you please refrain from creating rumors that will hurt her.”

Source: JoongAng via Nate, TV Daily via Nate

All of Korea’s top female stars have appeared on an odd Chinese advertisement!

Han Ye Seul, Lee Hyori, Lee Tae Ran, Choi Jung Won, and a few other female celebrities appeared as promoting a drink that makes your breasts bigger. However, it seems as though the Chinese drink company have unlawfully used pictures of these celebrities, and netizens are stating that actions should be taken to protect the celebrities.

These pictures were revealed to the public by a netizen who introduced himself as a “Chinese resident employee”. In the pictures were advertisement flyers which included pictures and signatures of famous Korean stars, and there’s even Korean on the flyers. For example, next to the picture  of Lee Hyori are the words “fairly nice big breasted woman” in Korean. 

The netizen who uploaded this picture stated, “I don’t think all the top stars of Korea will agree to be models of this advertisement. The officials should quickly make actions against this violation to the celebrities’ rights to their picture.”

Han Ye Seul’s entertainment company, SidusHQ, stated, “Han Ye Seul has never participated in this advertisement. It seems as though it is a violation to the celebrities’ rights to their pictures. We will make sure actions will be taken.”

Source + Picture: Financial News via Yahoo! Korea