[OSEN=손남원 기자] The borderless popularity of YG’s real survival program to determine the formation of next boy group, ‘WHO IS NEXT: WIN’, has been proven as Japan’s largest video-sharing website Niconico Video confirmed the streaming of the program.
‘WIN’ just hit the highest viewing rate for the latest show, episode 7, garnering much popularity from the Korean fans. Now the high demand for the program is being seen around the world, especially from Japan where a great number of fans requested the show to be aired locally.
In response to the growing popularity amongst Japanese fans, Niconico Video promptly decided to do a special streaming of the program from episode 1 to 9, mainly showing summarized scenes from the show, for 3 consecutive days from Oct 21 (Monday). This is a clear testament to how popular the show has become in Japan.
Just for the fans in Japan, Niconico Video will reveal clips that are not seen elsewhere, such as members’ interviews along with the original video.
There are two Teams, A (Song Min Ho, Kim Jin Woo, Lee Seung Hoon, Nam Tae Hyun and Kang Seung Yoon) and B (B.I., Kim Jin Hwan, Bobby, Song Yoon Hyung, Koo Jun Hoe and Kim Dong Hyuk) on the program ‘WIN’. Both teams will go through 3 battles to win the group name ‘WINNER’ to make a debut. ‘WIN’ is a survival audition program, which the result completely depends on the viewers’ votes.
In South Korea, the program name ranked #1 for the most searched word (real-time) on search engine after episode 7 was aired, while hitting the highest viewing rate out of all episodes. Youku, the largest video-sharing website in China streams the show exclusively. Episodes 1, 4 and 5 raked in 1 million viewers already, proving its extreme popularity.
With the second battle coming up, Japanese fans are showing much enthusiasm to participate in the voting—another clear sign of the program’s globally-arching popularity and the members’ potential of becoming the next Korean Wave leaders.
The voting starts for the second battle immeidately after episode 8 ends on Oct 11 (Friday), and will last for 3 days. Fans can vote using a portal site DAUM or Kakao Talk, or Kakao Talk’s game Fantasy Runners for Kakao.
It is also drawing huge attention from abroad and has been airing in 10 different Asian countries from Sept 17, including on STAR TV-related channel V and East Asia’s CJ E&M channel M. Youku, the largest video-sharing website in China streams the show exclusively. It has also been airing in 188 countries through Arirang TV to reach more international fans.
Source: YG-LIFE