The hot search about BOYNEXTDOOR's "de-fanning" has been hanging for a whole weekend, causing the fuse of "de-fanning", which is far more serious than the common "idol love".
BOYNEXTDOOR是HYBE旗下廠牌KOZ ENTERTAINMENT推出的韓國男團，因為組合名被KPOP粉圈稱為“門童”。他們原定3月29日在泰國曼谷舉辦演唱會，受到緬甸大地震影響，演出被取消，成員們已經落地韓國，但大批粉絲被迫滯留泰國。
It is not uncommon for concerts to be canceled due to force majeure, but in the first announcement issued by KOZ ENTERTAINMENT, it only mentioned that the members are now safe, and did not offer compensation for the actual losses of fans, which caused an uproar in the fan circle and went out of the circle to the public opinion field.
BOYNEXTDOOR WAS SCOLDED FOR BEING ON A HIGH-RANKING HOT SEARCH, AND MANY FANS IN THE KPOP CIRCLE JOINED FORCES TO SPREAD INFORMATION ON MAJOR SOCIAL PLATFORMS, AND SOME STATIONS PROPOSED HIGH-PRICED AIR TICKETS THAT COULD SUPPORT FANS TO GO HOME AND HELP FANS GO HOME SAFELY.
LOOKING BACK AT THE BEGINNING OF THE INCIDENT, BOYNEXTDOOR'S HANDLING OF THE INCIDENT WAS AN UNDOUBTED PUN DISASTER. It exposes the lack of protection of fans' rights and interests, and almost hurtfully loses the core of the professional attribute of "idols" - care and love for fans.
Reconstruct the complete timeline of the day of the event, everything is full of magic and incredible.
At 2025:00 p.m. on October 0, a 0.0 earthquake occurred in Myanmar (0.0 degrees north latitude, 0.0 degrees east longitude) with an epicenter depth of 0 kilometers. According to CCTV News, this earthquake is the largest earthquake in the world since 0 years. Thailand, which borders Myanmar, was naturally affected by the earthquake, and on the day of the earthquake, the prime minister declared a state of emergency in the capital, Bangkok.
Southeast Asia, especially Thailand, has always been an important town for KPOP idol groups on their Asian tours, and the idol boy group BOYNEXTDOOR was originally scheduled to hold a concert in Bangkok, Thailand on 29/0. On the day of the earthquake, all members had already arrived in Thailand.
After the earthquake, many Chinese fans fell into the anxiety of waiting for news: because Thailand itself was not the epicenter of the earthquake, before the organizers issued a statement, there were still fans who did not change their tickets back to China with the expectation that "the concert may be held as scheduled".
根據粉絲保留的截圖，28日當日下午3點30分左右，演唱會取消的公告發出，但很快就刪除了帖子——這個“插曲”在當時沒有受到關注，由於機票、酒店、演唱會票價格都十分高昂，並且取消公告隨後被刪除，不少粉絲仍然選擇了留下。
It's just that what they didn't expect was that the fans stayed, but the hero of the concert, BOYNEXTDOOR, chose to leave.
BOYNEXTDOOR ARRIVED SAFELY AT THE AIRPORT IN SOUTH KOREA
粉絲能夠通過愛豆的身份信息查詢航班，已經是飯圈內部常見的灰色產業。根據粉絲發佈的聊天記錄，當天下午4點，就有傳來BOYNEXTDOOR改航班、將在今日返回首爾的消息。但是，這一消息只是傳聞——沒有官方聲明，成員們也沒有在任何社交平台上發佈即將返韓的消息。
It wasn't until around 40:00 pm on 0 p.m. that the official announcement of the concert cancellation was released. At that time, Bangkok's transportation was almost paralyzed, and there were no flights back to China on the same day, so fans could not return to China on the same day.
The "silence" of the official and idol groups throughout the whole process was interpreted by many people as "afraid of fans and themselves grabbing tickets": because of the large number of fans, but the flight seats were very short in the case of the earthquake, and there were rumors in the afternoon of the same day that the Thai air traffic control department issued a no-fly order for all airports in the country.
3月28日晚9點左右，BOYNEXTDOOR全體現身泰國機場，搭乘飛機返回首爾。此處還有一個令人匪夷所思的小插曲是，據一位韓國粉絲發在社交媒體上的帖子所說，她們提前預約了機場的擺渡車服務，但BOYNEXTDOOR的經紀人突然衝到她們一行人面前找車、不讓她們靠近，之後坐上她們原本預約的擺渡車揚長而去。當時已經沒有剩餘的擺渡車了，粉絲們只能走路前往——由於傳到國內網路的時間太過巧合，被不少網友認為是BOYNEXTDOOR在返韓時搶了粉絲的擺渡車，加重了輿論的負面情緒。
At the same time, it was rumored on the Internet that Bangkok was about to fall into a power outage, and fans stranded in Thailand could only help each other, and the BOYNEXTDOOR fan station released an important information summary Weibo, including airline cancellation and change policies, self-help strategies, temporary resting places, etc., and specially summarized the information of lost fans to find people.
Looking back on this incident, in addition to not only failing to issue a concert cancellation announcement in time, BOYNEXTDOOR also seriously lacked public relations handling after the incident.
The cancellation of the concert due to force majeure is a situation that many parties, such as brokerage companies, idols, and fans, do not want to see - the earthquake is one of the most serious natural disasters, because of the cancellation of the concert by the earthquake, fans will certainly feel heartache for missing an opportunity to meet their idols, but they can only accept it helplessly, and may even worry about the personal safety of their idols.
2024年，原定於5月1日舉辦的五月天香港演唱會因暴雨天氣影響取消，延期至5月9日。取消公告發出后，主唱陳信巨集在多個社交媒體平台發文，並回復大量評論感謝粉絲諒解。主辦方宣佈取消后的24小時內，發佈了退改票方案：購買了5月1日演出票的觀眾，可按原門票原定座位觀看延期後的演唱會，無法觀看的可以全額退票，外地來港的粉絲可以申請上限1000港幣的住宿補貼和上限2000港幣的交通補貼。
Also a Korean group, EXO still came to Shanghai to perform for fans at his own expense when the sponsor's temporary withdrawal of funds and inability to get the performance fee for the Shanghai concert in 2016 years, and the member kai even went on stage on crutches, the live sound conditions were very poor, and the stage performance effect was far from the normal level, but fans will still miss this concert many years later.
In 2023, the Thai concert of HYBE's girl group LE SSERAFIM was urgently canceled due to the member's flu, although the company's handling was criticized by a large number of fans, but member Sakura Miyawaki also chose to apologize on the fan software as soon as possible, reply to fan comments, and release a long article to thank fans again after returning to South Korea.
然而，BOYNEXTDOOR此次的處理方式完全不夠及時：最早對這次演唱會取消進行回應的成員，發文時間在3月28日當晚10點54分，距離發佈取消曼谷場公告已經過去了將近5個小時，甚至有3名成員發文時間在29日早上7點，存在嚴重滯後。
In the concert cancellation announcement released by KOZ ENTERTAINMENT, it did not make any compensation promises for fans' back-and-forth drinks and ticket purchases. IN TERMS OF BOTH EMOTIONAL VALUE AND FINANCIAL COMPENSATION, BOYNEXTDOOR'S RESPONSE WAS FAR FROM SUFFICIENT.
In the handling of this incident on the Taiwan Forum of China, some netizens replied: "Even if it is a same-day flight, if you can change the flight and send a cancellation notice, fans don't even have to take risks, how can you transfer the obligation of choice to fans at this time and ask fans to consider it themselves?" The money is all made by the company, why do you want fans to face the war between heaven and man to take risks, they deserve to be scolded, and I will also lose my fans. ”
On the other hand, such a lagged and silent public relations measure will also cause harm to the image of "idol" itself.
During the period when the "Korean Wave" hit many years ago, KPOP idol groups were generally regarded as "complete" artists, and their high-quality stage performance ability was the basis for them to gain a foothold in the industry and surpass other groups.
But perhaps due to the impact of the advent of the social media era and the catalysis of the epidemic, fans cannot watch idols' performances offline, and can only learn more about their moments through online channels, and the "value" of idols has quietly changed: the "business" of idols on social media platforms and their attitudes when signing sales have increased the weight in the judgment criteria of fans.
The ability to sing and dance is no longer all that idols have in today's world, and idol groups not only sell sexual charm and fantasy, but also embody the consumption of emotional value that has been more and more valued in recent years. The vast majority of KPOP idol groups have opened their own fan-exclusive software, and idols will update their daily dynamics in the software, and have "one-to-many" conversations with fans, and fans will subscribe to this "interaction" by paying a membership fee. For many fans, even if their idols' personal abilities in vocal, dance and other aspects are not as good as their teammates, as long as they are "sincere" enough to their fans, they can gain love from fans.
Communication and exchange with fans, and showing their "love" to fans have also become a compulsory course for idols. The most common reason for de-fanning on Weibo's "de-fanning bot", in addition to finding more conventional events such as idol love and negative news, the most common is "I haven't remembered my name after signing idols several times" and "video signing and cutting the small screen" and other attitude problems.
Therefore, BOYNEXTDOOR's public relations handling is particularly difficult for fans to accept: their hurried return to Seoul and communication with fans on social platforms until they get on a plane seem to have no care and love for fans.
The concept of BOYNEXTDOOR is directly reflected in the group's name, which is "The Boy Next Door". Their combination concept and style of music are not to take the sexy and handsome hormonal route, but are more neighborly and fresh, just like the handsome younger brother who can be seen when you look back in the young campus time.
And this "silent" departure, the image shown to fans collapsed all of a sudden: the brother next door who confessed to you cordially seemed to have become an indifferent and empathetic stranger overnight.