Copyright and Other Dilemmas

Image from Donnapie @ Tumblr

When I graduated from college ten years ago with a degree in English, I only knew one thing: I wanted to spend the rest of my life working with books. So far, I’ve managed to do it—but with each passing day, it becomes less and less clear whether my industry will still exist by the time I’m ready to retire. And two reasons why book publishing is on such shaky ground are the erosion of copyright enabled by the digital revolution, and the lack of respect it breeds for the services my employer and I provide.

So it’s perhaps unsurprising that I’m torn when it comes to fansubs. On the one hand, I love them—they’re for the people and by the people, and often far, far superior to the official subtitles. (See, for example, my fawning discussion of the differences between the subtitles on Coffee Prince’s DVD and the ones created by WITH S2.) On the other hand, I see why the networks and their sanctioned international outlets don’t appreciate fansubs. They’re companies just like the one I work at, and they need to make money to survive. When fansubs are easily available, the dramas’ makers lose control of the product they’ve invested in and are less able to recoup the money they’ve spent.

And when that happens, everybody loses: When you can’t find a decent book to read in ten years because everyone’s self-publishing unedited crap on Amazon, don’t come crying to me. I’m going to be too busy working swing shifts at McDonald’s and falling out of America’s ever-dwindling middle class.

But my sympathy for the makers of Kdramas doesn’t mean that I wasn’t horrified to realize that two of my favorite Kdrama sites disappeared earlier this week: MySoju and DramaTic (z”l). There’s some interesting discussion of what happened on last Friday’s Dramabeans open thread (see the posts starting at 35). Presumably, both sites fell victim to complaints about the legality of their subtitles. (Here’s a site that confirms that Drama Fever filed a cease and desist suit against Google, probably as owner of YouTube.)

I’m as guilty of watching illegally streamed video as the next person, but I only do it when I want to watch something that’s not available from a legitimate source. I happily pay my Drama Fever annual fee (a bargain at twice the price) and am also about to pony up so I can use Hulu Plus on my Roku.

Because I’m a mental midget when it comes to techy things like getting subs and video from different sources and making them work together, watching downloaded dramas isn’t the slightest bit of a temptation for me. This means my relationship with DramaTic has largely been as a reader of commentary—he kept me real. It’s easy to get lost in fangirlish OTP obsessiveness and lose light of things like a show’s objective quality and actual, qualitative merit. DramaTic never did that, and although our opinions differ on a lot of fronts (e.g, I ♥ trendies), the context and sense of history provided by that site have made me an infinitely better, more informed viewer of Korean drama.

I can see filing copyright complaints against My Soju: it is to Kdrama what crack dens are to the real world. But DramaTic? Its owner was only posting translated text files, not video. The ugly truth, though, is that both the words and images that make up our dramas belong to their copyright holders, and they can file suit about abuses against either.

The question is, Why should they? A rising tide lifts all boats. Thanks to fansubs, these dramas reach passionate international viewers the television networks themselves aren’t prepared to exploit—and those international viewers do things like buy DVDs, soundtracks, and ridiculous tchotchkes. (You certainly would not find a replica of the necklace Jun Pyo made for Jan Di in my jewelry box. No, you certainly would not.) When someone fansubs a show, it’s a giant advertisement for not just sixteen (or twenty or a hundred) hours of television—it’s an advertisement for an entire genre. Maybe even an entire nation.

This crackdown on grass-roots support for their product is even worse in light of its fundamental hypocrisy: Guess who subbed the show I’m watching on Drama Fever right now? That’s right…WITH S2. That fansub site is credited at the beginning of each and every episode of 9 Ends 2 Outs—and a lot of other shows that Drama Fever continues to stream. They’re benefiting every day from the efforts of some fansubers, yet they turn around and file copyright claims against others. On what planet does that make sense?

In a lot of ways, this reminds me of the state of American popular music in the early 2000s. As that point, it seemed likely that peer-to-peer file trading would wipe out traditional record labels, and maybe even the music industry itself. But after a lot of regrettable fighting against the people they should have been courting—music lovers around the world—the music industry was saved by one thing: the convenience and accessibility of iTunes. Back in the day, I used Napster and Limewire and Pirate Bay just like every other college kid. But now that it’s so incredibly easy and affordable to buy from legitimate sources, why would I bother to download things illegally? 

With the help of its sales network, the music industry made itself indispensable not by crushing the people who loved their product, but by finding a way to work with them. That’s what Drama Fever should be doing right now: providing a service so good, universally accessible, and complete that fansubs wouldn’t be necessary.

As an English-speaking North American viewer, I know I’m incredibly lucky: Korean networks will do practically anything to get their dramas into my hands and on my TV. The potential market here is huge, and just like the purveyors of Kpop, they want a piece of that pie. But for that to happen, they need to realize that biting the hand that feeds them isn’t going to help.

Imagine how much time someone like DramaTic’s webmaster invested in the many, many hours worth of subs he made available at his site. Instead of having websites like his removed from the Internet, the Kdrama Overlords should thank whatever God they pray to every day for their dedicated fans. 

I honestly believe there’s a way for everyone to win here—why not find it?

You might be unhealthily obsessed with Korean drama if...

In this screencap from Big, the role of Amanda is played by Suzy.
The role of Korean drama is played by Gong Yoo.

It’s physically impossible for you to be within seventy feet of a computer without checking Dramabeans and Couch Kimchi for updates.

You’ve watched more than 5 drama episodes in a row…after midnight.

At any given moment, you know how much a plane ticket to Seoul would cost. (A ten-day birthday trip in October? Roundtrip Boston to Incheon, $1,235.50.)

You’ve ever canvassed the local Asian markets in search of a bottle of soju…or six.

You can’t see a Mini Cooper without checking the driver’s seat for Choi Han Gyul.
 

You’ve caused yourself actual physical pain by doing the finger-flick against your own forehead, just because you wanted to know what the leads in your drama were going through.

You think your bedroom décor would be massively improved with the addition of Piggy Bunny.

You religiously read DramaTic, and plan to consider it a significant personal milestone when you’re finally able to recognize at least half of the dramas mentioned by name in any given post.

You’ve said the word aigoo aloud in a totally unironic manner.

You live in fear of Internet data caps.

You’ve watched a raw drama episode before it was subbed. You had no idea what the hell was going on, but at least the wait was over.


Your neighbors have ever asked why you were bellowing, “For the love of God, look both ways before you cross the road!” while alone in your apartment.

You can’t read a single song title on your iPod’s top 25 list. (But they’re all categorized as “Kdrama OST.”)

You can sing along with each of said top 25 songs—phonetically.

You've turned your family and friends into a crack team of spies North Korea would envy. Every time they come across something related to South Korea, however tangentially, they drop everything to let you know. ("Guess where my new underwear were made!")

A disproportionate number of the bookmarks in your Web browser have the word Korea in them.

You’ve re-watched your favorite Korean drama from beginning to end in 48 hours or less for the express purpose of improving your mood after a terrible week.

Your consumption of rice, ramen, and green onions has recently skyrocketed.

Learning Korean has moved from item 8.751 x 10⁸⁰⁰ to number 10 on your list of things to do before you die. (And it’s only slightly more likely to happen than item 11: Make out with Gong Yoo.)

You think the hanbok is a good, universally flattering look that should be revived in the modern world. And your closet.

You have your own Kdrama blog. (Bonus points if counting your own visits would probably quintuple the number of hits it has received.)

You know the full names of every character in Sungkyunkwan Scandal, but suspect you can accurately pronounce none of them. (Or, indeed, the show’s title.)

You’ve watched a single drama more than three times…in one month.

Your primary reason for wanting a boyfriend/husband/older brother is to have an opportunity to call someone “oppa.” If you have a boyfriend/husband/older brother, you have—much to his surprise and confusion—called him “oppa.”
 
You’ve worried about the military enlistment of a man you’ve never met, in a country you’ve never been to. (Will the other soldiers pick on him because he distracted their girlfriends by being so cute in his dramas?!?!)

...Any others?

State of the Obsession Address: May 2012

Always a sucker for a useless routine, I’ve naturally developed a strategy for watching Korean dramas: I only watch things that have finished airing in Korea and are fully subbed; I complete one drama before starting on another; and I stagger eras—for every recent drama, I watch one that aired before 2009.

It’s unclear to even me if it’s possible for a human to be more geeky than that, but what’s a girl to do? Kdrama is more than just an insanely entertaining watch—it‘s something I want to learn about and really understand. And to me this random routine feels like a logical stepping stone toward this end—it allows me to fully digest a show at my own pace and not get confused by watching a bunch of other dramas at the same time, and also forces me to see not just where Korean drama is now, but where it came from.

After a nearly a year of obsessive viewing, I’m starting to get a feel for the cycle of Kdrama. Right now, for example, the late spring batch of shows is about to wrap up airing and be replaced by the early summer group. (Whether Korea has anything like American television seasons I have yet to figure out—it seems that new shows are always airing, no matter what time of year it is.) Thanks to my Dustin-Hoffman-in-Rainman level OCD, I have yet to start watching the currently airing shows, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have my eye on them.

Here’s a brief accounting of the ones I’m most excited for:

 

Queen In-Hyun’s Man. This time travel romance features a Joseon-era man and a modern woman. It’s driving online reviewers absolutely gaga with adoration, which is almost always a good sign. I loved the male lead in his My Sweet City role, and am looking forward to more of his gangly, easygoing charm. (Episodes 11 and 12 out of 16 will air this week.)

Equator Man. Improbably, reading about this show is making me long for the old days of Korean drama, before everything had to be high-concept and big budget. By all accounts, it includes no body swapping, vampires, or time travel, and instead focuses on classic, character-driven revenge melodrama. Sign me up! (Episodes 19 and 20 out of 20 will air this week.)

King 2 Hearts. I want to love this show, I really do. Koreans, like Americans, seem intrigued by the concept of monarchy—probably because our countries have been without kings for generations. The plot sounds fairly standard: a spoiled chaebol/king meets and falls in love with a hardworking, underprivileged girl, who just happens to have been trained to kill him. I worry, though, that viewers are falling into distinct camps: people who loved 2011’s Secret Garden love this show, and people who hated Secret Garden hate King 2 Hearts. I fall squarely into the second category, so things aren’t looking good. (Episodes 19 and 20 out of 20 will air this week.)

Rooftop Prince. Bummer for the Joseon era—all its upstanding young scholar types have been time traveling to the modern world lately. Not that I’m complaining—the fish-out-of-water trope is almost always good fun. Here’s hoping Park Yoochun manages to be half as cute in this show as he was in Sungkyunkwan Scandal, one of my all-time favorites. He wasn't in the lame-tastic Miss Ripley, so the jury is definitely out on this drama, too. (Episodes 19 and 20 out of 20 will air this week.)

And then, of course, there’s the next batch of shows to look forward to:

Big. My expectations for this drama are too high, I think—I’m going to end up feeling totally let down if it’s something other than the funniest, sweetest Kdrama I’ve ever seen. It has a lot going for it: its writers are known for amusing characters and funny moments, and I couldn’t find its cast more appealing if I’d picked them myself. On the other hand, its writers are also known for less-than-spectacular follow-through and shaky plotting. Plus, this will be the first post-Coffee Prince project I’ve seen Gong Yoo in—I worry my soulmate Choi Han Gyul will be retroactively sullied by a subpar performance/drama. As of 5/22, Couch Kimchi has posted a boatload of teasers and previews for this show—the more I see, the more I like. (P.S. Does the above poster stolen from mysoju.com position the drama’s title right over...well...you know? Will this poor actor ever escape jokes about...cigar size?) (Currently included in Dramafever’s list of dramas coming soon; whether it will be simulcast is still unclear. Begins airing June 4.)

I Do, I Do. Korea’s answer to Knocked Up should be tons of fun—how can you go wrong with My Lovely Sam Soon’s Kim Sun Ah in a steamy noona romance? She has a way of playing characters who are better than the typical ditzy female leads, whether that’s because of good script choices or her own sheer awesomeness. (Begins airing May 30.) 

Bridal Mask. Most recent sageuks are set in the distant past, but this drama takes place during Japan’s occupation of Korea in the early twentieth century. It sounds like a period version of City Hunter, complete with a masked avenger bent on revenge for wrongs against his family. I’m hoping Bridal Mask will be less air-headed than its obvious predecessor. After all, the lead must have some depth and a social conscience—dude is an independence fighter who regularly traffics with spies. My fingers are crossed for a gritty, real-world vibe, rather than the shellacked gloss of that other show. (Currently included in Dramafever’s list of dramas coming soon; whether it will be simulcast is still unclear. Begins airing May 30.)

Timeslip Dr. Jin. To be frank, I haven’t loved a medical drama since the early days of ER. With the addition of time travel and the lovely Kim Jaejong, though, this might just be worth watching. (Begins airing May 26.)

(Thanks to the ever-wonderful [and better-informed than me] Dramabeans and DramaTic for almost all this information.)

In the meanwhile, what shall we do while waiting for these new dramas? Here are some suggestions.

State of the Obsession Address (with Links!)

I’m prone to intemperate fits of obsession, so my reaction to Korean drama isn’t entirely without precedent. It’s the way I’m built: just as some people are good at sports or math or learning foreign languages, I’m good at loving random things far beyond sense or logic. This may seem like a bad thing, but I’ve actually come to pity the rest of the world, the middle-of-the-road-masses who don’t even know what it’s like to be utterly, irrationally swept up in something.

From bubblegum pop to food porn to the Harry Potter books to the movie Inception, I’ve spent the past decade enmeshed in one fleeting, geekish passion after another. For however brief a window, these things have shaped not only how I spent my free time, but also how I viewed the world. Kdrama is no exception: I’m in the process of reading the Insight Guide to South Korea from cover to cover. Every time I experience a negative emotion, I find myself doing the patented Kdrama sneer. No matter how bizarre a scenario may be, I can always come up with a drama-inspired platitude. (“You’re stressed about selling your house? Well, like Baek Seung Jo’s mom said in Playful Kiss, Every pot has a lid. You just need to find the right buyer.”) And whenever I go out with friends I agitate for a trip to the local Korean restaurant. (I’m a big fan of japchae, but dukboki is so spicy that one bite made me want to amputate my tongue.)

The most insane of my obsessions have always had an online component. I created my first webpage in 1997, and I’ve been involved with the Internet in one way or another ever since. First there was Hometown AOL, then my own fannish domain, then Livejournal, then fanfiction.net, and then a series of short-lived, not particularly interesting or successful blogs—like the one you’re reading right now.

Jumping into Kdrama fandom with both feet has been a pleasure; it’s a whole new world to discover, and I love reading people’s commentary about Korean drama just as much as I love watching the shows themselves. The weird thing, though, is how little commentary I’ve been able to find. The fandoms I’ve been involved with in the past have been incredibly active and thrived worldwide; any one of them has inspired much, much more commentary than you could possibly read in a lifetime, most of it in English. On the other hand, I usually devote one lunch hour a week to reading about Korean drama—and I often run out of new posts on my old standby sites long before that hour is up.

I think this is partially because I’ve missed the boat—the peak of Korean drama fanishness on the Internet seems to have lasted from about 2007 to 2009. The blogs and websites I’ve been able to dig up during the past few months have mostly been survivors from this time, and often on their last legs: they’re rarely updated and most of the new material they post feels more like habit than excitement. Sites like soompi and allkpop may be going strong, but they’re just too overwhelming for me, and their focus tends to be on kpop, not drama.

It could just be that I’m looking in all the wrong places. Back in the early days of Internet fandom no webpage was considered complete without an exhaustive list of links to other sites of interest. Today’s excellent search engines have made this less common, and most blogs I visit only link to a few other places. So could it be that Kdrama commentary Shangri-la exists out there, and I’m missing it by a Google search?

All this is not to say that I haven’t found any essential reading when it comes to Korean drama. Because I have—and here’s an alphabetical, annotated list.

(A few notes: I’ve only posted sites that update at least a few times a month. There are lots of dead blogs out there worth visiting for specific information or discussion of older shows, but I haven’t bothered with them here. Also, I’m not a great fan of straight-up show recaps, so no sites focused on them are included here.)

Couch Kimchi. Celebrity news; drama talk, pics, and videos; and helpful tips about resources for online drama watchers.

Dodo’s Bell Jar. News and commentary along with exploration of kdrama as a life changing event. (My favorite part.)

Dramabeans. The ne plus ultra of Korean drama on the web. Clearly, everyone even remotely interested in Kdrama has been here, and for good reason: it’s frequently updated with pertinent news, funny commentary, great recaps, and cultural insight. Its community of like-minded commenters gets the spotlight every Friday in a fun open thread that’s great for figuring out what other people are watching and why.

DramaTic. A graduate-level course on Kdrama production, history, and culture. Fascinating, even though the webmaster has very, very different taste in dramas than I do.

Electric Ground. A great resource for cultural information, although recent updates have been slow.

Idle Revelry. Smart and insightful analysis of characters, scenes, and dramas that will make you see even old favorites in a new light.

Kaede + Jun. A fun selection of news, drama reviews, and commentary. (The video of Park Shi Ho and kittens currently on the main page is not to be missed.)

Mad Dino Asylum. Lots of recaps, but I come here for the short, to-the-point drama reviews that include helpful lists of similar shows.

Silky Jade. Thoughtful, in-depth discussion and reviews of selected shows.

  

So that’s what I’ve found in the course of my Kdrama obsession. Any other sites or blogs I should be visiting?