ABC7 News, a broadcasting news in San Francisco California, aired something about kpop wave.The whole video actually talks about Korea's economy, culture and the hallyu wave and on the video they featured Super Junior and Girls Generation.
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Girls' Generation's successful breakthrough into Japan has culminated in another milestone: their debut Japanese album "Girls' Generation" has been certified double platinum by the RIAJ. The RIAJ, or Recording Industry Association of Japan, recognizes 250,000 copies sold as platinum certification. With the double platinum certification, the "Girls' Generation" album has officially sold over 500,000 copies in just over a month after its June 1 release.

This is the latest indication of the overwhelming success that Girls' Generation has achieved in Japan. On July 6, Tower Records announced that Girls' Generation topped their June chart with their debut album. Last month, Oricon revealed that Girls' Generation had the highest earnings by a foreign artist in Japan for the first half of 2011, as they recorded 2.6 billion yen in total sales.

The strong push into the Japanese market for the first seven months of 2011 will continue with the final performance of the Japan Arena Concert Tour, which will take place in Fukuoka on July 17.

Source: RIAJ
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Japan’s largest internet portal site, Yahoo Japan released the ‘Search Ranking for First Half of 2011′ on July 7th.

In the celebrity search category, SNSD and Kara were ranked 4th and 5th respectively. Japan’s national girl group, AKB48 took the no.1 spot while Arashi, the popular male idol group who made their names through their music as well as variety shows in Japan came in 2nd. Atsuko Maeda, who won the AKB48 Senbatsu General Election in June, took the no.3 spot on the Yahoo Japan search ranking.

credit: tvdaily.co.kr

According to Daum Communications on July 8th, SNSD’s summer images can be downloaded through Daum’s cloud services (http://cloud.daum.net).

SNSD members’ summer pictures are shared through Daum Cloud promotion page (http://durl.me/budxy). The pictures are available as wallpapers for PC (4 types) with different resolutions, 1 type for iPhone and Android phones respectively. On every Tuesday and Friday, the individual images of SNSD members will be revealed and on August 9th, photos featuring all members will also be available.

In addition to this, if one downloads the Daum Cloud Application, he/she might stand a chance to be among the 306 lucky prize winners decided through lucky draws. This is part of the ‘Download Daum Cloud App and Win An Ipad 2 Instantly!’ event which will end on August 11th.

Daum Communications’ Planning Team Leader, Kwon JiYoung said, “In order to provide Daum Cloud users with variety of fun and excitement, the SNSD summer pictures download event was organized. Daum Cloud services which can be used anywhere, anytime on PC and mobile devices regardless of capacity, provide more convenience to the users”.

Initially, Daum Cloud services was launched in March this year with maximum file upload of 4GB with optimized pictures and documents integration functions. It supports multiple platforms such as Windows, Mac, etc through PC Sync application. Starting from June, the storage space for users of Daum Cloud was increased to 50GB, providing more storage capabilities and advantages.

Credit: asiae.co.kr

SNSD is everywhere at the railway stations in Korea,check out their new CF for Daum here

Japan’s largest record store, Tower Records released the ‘Kpop Chart for June’ on July 6th. SNSD’s 1st Japanese Album ‘Girls’ Generation’ which was released on June 1st, captured the no.1 spot.

‘Girls’ Generation’ which contains 12 songs including their Japanese debut song ‘Genie’, ‘Gee’, ‘Mr.Taxi’, ‘Run Devil Run’, etc was also ranked 3rd in the monthly pre-order chart for May. After the album was released on June 1st, it climbed to the top spot of Oricon Weekly Album Chart, with recorded sales of 232,000 copies in the first week. With the consistent sales volume, SNSD’s debut album was also named one of the top 10 best selling album on Oricon for the first half of 2011 with sales of 325,658 copies.
Besides ‘Girls’ Generation’, FT Island’s ‘Return’ and ‘Five Treasure Island’ took 2nd and 5th spot respectively on Tower Records’ ‘Kpop Chart for June’. f(x)’s 1st album repackaged ‘Hot Summer’ captured the no.3 spot while Beast’s ‘Fiction and Fact’ was ranked 4th. Big Bang’s ’2011 Big Bang Concert Live Album Big Show: Big Bang Live Album’ came in 6th while Kim HyunJoong’s ‘Breakdown’ took the no.7 spot. CN Blue’s ‘First Step’ came in 8th, 2pm’s ‘Hands Up’in 9th while the DVD album of KBS2 drama (starring Jang GeunSuk) ‘Marry Me, Mary!’ secured the 10th spot.

Credit: sportschosun.com

>> Update 1: ‘Girls’ Generation’ came in second on the Oricon Monthly Album Chart!
SNSD’s debut Japanese album ‘Girls’ Generation’ came in second on the Oricon Monthly Album Chart with a total of 411,972 copies sold in June. The girls are second only to the massive sales of 715,722 copies sold by popular Japanese girl group AKB48′s latest album ‘Koko ni Ita Koto’!

Credit: Oricon

As more Korean stars step into Japanese showbiz, the Japanese convenience store market is jumping on the Hallyu marketing bandwagon by getting Korean stars to endorse or to advertise their products.

On July 6th, it was announced by 7-Eleven Japan that TVXQ and SNSD’s official products for the convenience store chain will go on sale in all of its 13,334 stores in the nation.

At the same time, TVXQ and SNSD’s videos and posters will also be given out during an upcoming campaign.

The 7-Eleven stores will be selling TVXQ official products such as Korean Kimchi Ramyeon, Deok-Balbi and ten other items while six official SNSD items will also be on sale at the same time.

Products promoted by SNSD, such as the Korean Rice-roll lunchbox can be easily recognised as typical Korean goods, while products like the Honey, Ginger and Chewy Cake with unclear origins are also included.

In response to this, a 7-Eleven Holdings representative said, “Although many Japanese retailers are using Korean stars as advertising models, it is the first time in Japan that official products are brought into the market.”

He also added, “The plan to sell Korean wave products is also made based on the fact that Korean products are popular in the Tokyo Koreatown (Shin-Okubo).”

Credit: asiatoday.co.kr, Bestiz
Translated by: [email protected]

After the news of 7-Eleven Japan's special campaign broke, fans have been anticipating the upcoming commercial movies. This morning, the BTS video for the first CM was released through Sukkiri.

The video shows some footage of the photoshoot as well as the behind-the-scenes footage for their CM filming. Several items of 7-Eleven merchandise was shown, and amongst them were a few Girls' Generation's customized products. The prizes for the 7-Eleven campaign lottery were featured alongside the other merchandise. More details about the lottery can be found here. On a side note, Sunny mentioned that the first CM will be released later on today so keep an eye out for that.

This event is a special campaign by 7-Eleven Japan and features Girls' Generation and TVXQ. Check out their first 7-Eleven campaign BTS video below.

Pictures of the special Girls' Generation merchandise for the 7-Eleven campaign can be found here.

Source: [email protected]
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Although Girls' Generation has only 3 more concerts before they wrap up their Arena Tour, their live performance events aren't ending yet. On August 13 and 20, Girls' Generation will perform for "2011 Incheon Korean Wave Concert" and "K-POP All Star Live in Niigata" respectively.

To support the Visit Korea campaign, the "2011 Incheon Korean Wave Concert" will be held on August 13 from 19:00 until 21:30. Other artists such as TVXQ, Super Junior, Big Bang, and 2PM will also participate in the concert. The concert will be held in Incheon Munhak Worldcup Stadium, Korea.

A week after the "2011 Incheon Korean Wave Concert", Girls' Generation will be performing in the Niigata Big Swan Stadium in Japan for the "K-POP All Star Live in Niigata". The price for the pre-sale tickets is ¥9800, and they will be up for purchase starting August 7 at 10:00. Fellow Korean artists that will perform together with the girls are KARA, SISTAR, SECRET, 4minute, CNBLUE, BEAST, Norazo, INFINITE, and 2AM.

It looks like Girls' Generation will continue to be active until the end of the year. Are you excited for the upcoming performances?

Source: Korean Culture, Visit Korea
Written by: [email protected]
Contributor: [email protected]

After Paris, Peruvian fans showed that they too can make their voices heard and they are dying to catch a glimpse of their beloved SM Town artistes.

About 4,000 Peruvian Kpop fans gathered in Lima, the capital city of Peru on July 3rd (KST), holding banners with captions like ‘SMTown in Peru’, etc to request for the SM Town Live World Tour concert to be held in Peru, South America.

Following that effort, on July 5th, a video was revealed through YouTube, showing how the Peruvian fans experienced the Korean food, dance, Taekwando and cultural activities. In addition to that, they also showcased their talents on stage, performing some of SM Town artistes’ biggest hits, as well as sending messages to cheer on their beloved idols.

Other than that, fans in Peru have also started petition campaigns on Twitter and Facebook.

Credit: tvdaily.co.kr/Risuchan9@YouTube