Imagine this
in 1811 , Napoleon is trying to decide what to do next.
He had a page, who was a Mameluke slave, brought from Egypt. (In real history the Mameluke followed Napoleon to St. Helena.)
The Mameluke can't quite understand Napoleon's strategic problem, but he knows United Kingdom is Napoleon's biggest worry.
He rubs an old lamp someone gave to the Emperor but was given to the Mameluke's care.
Incredibly the fame Genie appears.
The Mameluke , given only one wish, asks the Genie to dry the English Channel for 3 days so Napoleon can cross it.
The Genie, after some misgivings, grants the wish with the stipulation that after the three days the Mameluke will die. The Mameluke obliges since he will never see his home again anyways.
Long story short, in a bright day in 1811 or 1812, the English channel dries. There is a wall of waves from Bournmouth to Cherbourg, and from Dover to Calais, and the sea gives way.
Napoleon, his Marshals and 250,000 troops, plus countless horses and artillery enter England.
Within 2 months, the Regent of UK surrenders to the Emperor, and Castlereagh, Wellsley and other anti French elements are given to the French to end their days in a lone island in Indian ocean called Bonaparte Island. (In real history it was called the ReUnion Island after 1815 and was primarily used to imprison Vietnamese kings who rebelled against France.)
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I read that Be'O and Lim Youngwoong, whom few foreigners know and care about, will lose their monthly Circle Awards because the format changed to Domestic 50% vs International 50%.
Which basically means the end of Domesticists in KPop.
Singers with NO foreign presence won't be allowed to win Circle Monthly charts.
It is said that Younha's song is #1 in the domestic chart, but if we consider foreign charts, her song is actually #6 since she is not well known outside of K-O-R-E-A.
The wave of change to allow foreign charts for consideration for Korean awards is too big to resist, especially when people like Lim Youngwoong began to win Grand Prizes.
I had argued for years, years and years to ignore whatever the K-O-R-E-A-N-S like and reflect more foreign opinion on awards. I think the two Grand Prizes Lim Youngwoong won at Melon made a big stir, and industry heads probably decided this kind of accident should never be allowed to happen again.
Which will prevent things like this from happening again
IU , the worst offender against KPop, the staunchest enemy of KPop expansion and the ultimate domesticist in Korean Pop who is opposed to any kind of move towards expansionism and the greatest obstacle of any act trying to make big in the world,
stands at the center , as the boss of the other acts in 2018 Gaon Award (Circle Award's previous name.)
Gaon/Circle Awards began to award songs from Jan 2011, and she won Feb 2011 (the story only I didn't know), Dec 2011 (You & I), Oct 2013 (Red Shoes), Mar 2017 (Through the Night), Apr 2017 (Palette), Oct 2018 (BbiBbi), Nov 2019 (Love Poem), May 2020 (Eight), Jan 2021 (Celebrity), Mar 2021 (Lilac) and Oct 2021 (Strawberry Moon), 12 awards, plus a bunch of smaller awards
If the new standard had been applied, IU would have won NONE of these awards, since she would have done badly in foreign charts.
It is only a matter of time that Golden Disk, also one of her playgrounds, will adopt this measure , probably from next year, so she will never win a prize from there as well.
Melon is a different matter since it is a private company which can set its own criteria, but that means it will be much less relevant to international fans, only watched by trot followers.
In one masterstroke of a pen, Circle made the domesticists irrelevant.
In the future, acts in K-O-R-E-A have to make songs which are palatable to the i-fans to be recognized, and those who make Korea-only songs will fall even farther behind than ever
Suddenly the iron control of Lee Jieun's domestic charts looks much less relevant, and it seems unlike many of history's culprits , she might get her comeuppance before too long as she sees none of her accomplishments being recognized because they are irrelevant as the world is concerned.
