KBS’ Music Bank under fire for ‘fabrication of scores’

Controversy is heating up over alleged fabrication of scores in Music Bank, a TV show that ranks songs and announces rankings.

In Friday’s episode of KBS’ "Music Bank," girl band AOA was atop by garnering 6,400 points overall with the song "Good Luck," beating over "Cheer Up" by another girl group Twice that acquired 6,314 points. However, a flurry of comments were posted on online communities suggesting that there was a problem with the process of calculating the music album score, among the scores AOA acquired.

AOA received 1,600 points in the music album category on the day. However, net users pointed out that the band’s score was exaggerated. The number of albums that AOA sold between May 16 and May 22 was about 21,000. In contrast, singer Jessica, who sold 37,000 albums, acquired 1,900 points, and group Monsta X, which sold 19,000 albums, garnered 999 points. If calculated based on the ratios, the album score that AOA was expected to receive was 1,070, in which case AOA’s total score would amount to 5,870 points, trailing Twice’s.

On this analysis, producers of Music Bank have yet to provide explanations. A netizen said, “If a broadcast accident occurs in which singers’ rankings change in such a way, the ranking system should be discarded,” while another netizen said, “(Problem with the music album category) was easily noticeable. We are expecting prompt explanations by the production team.”

김배중기자 wanted@donga.com