(Courtesy of SOOP)
AfreecaTV, South Korea’s first-generation interactive live-streaming service with a nearly two-decade-old history, has started a new chapter under a new brand SOOP by embracing streams beyond the Internet and its home country.
The company on Tuesday started streaming content under the new brand of SOOP in Korea as of noon, it announced on the same day.
The change in its local streaming service name comes after the company changed its corporate name to SOOP Co. from AfreecaTV Co. in March and was relisted as the new corporate name on Korea’s junior Kosdaq market in April.
A month later, the company relaunched its offshore service under the SOOP brand.
With the change in the local live-streaming service brand to SOOP, the company is set to deliver cohesive value between its local and foreign services to create synergy, the company said.
It currently has overseas operations in Hong Kong, the US and Thailand.
SOOP’s Chief Executive Jung Chan-yong last year vowed to go bold in its global expansion in 2024 for growth, which has stalled somewhat due to its outdated image as an internet TV media and some controversial content streaming.
SOOP’s shortform video service (Courtesy of SOOP)
TO CATCH UP WITH TWITCH
By eliminating TV from its service name, it hopes to compete better with its younger mobile-based rivals such as Twitch, a US video live-streaming service, in overseas markets and Korean portal giant Naver Corp.’s newly launched video streaming service Chzzk at home.
The global No. 1 real-time streaming service Twitch withdrew from Korea early this year due to high operational costs.
SOOP also hopes to broaden its user base after it has been struggling to add new users due to controversies over some of its streamers’ vulgar content, which has invited sharp criticism.
“The rebranding will lead us to take another leap as a user-centered open platform,” said Jung on Tuesday. “We will continue to make changes to create an environment in SOOP, in which streamers and users are encouraged to actively interact and participate.”
Old logo AfreecaTV (Courtesy of SOOP)
In line with the service rebranding, its real-time video streaming influencers or creators will be called ‘streamers,’ not BJs, or broadcasting jockeys, a unique term in Korea equivalent to a streamer on AfreecaTV.
But the name of the live gift, which streamers will collect during their interactive live streaming and can be exchanged for cash, will remain as Beol Poongsung, meaning a star balloon in English, the company said.
SOOP started offering beta service for the real-time personal broadcasting service ‘W’ in 2005 and changed the service name to ‘AfreecaTV’ in 2013.
It was the world’s first live-streaming service creating an environment where streamers could make money by launching a live gift system.
By Dong-jin Hwang
radhwang@hankyung.com
Sookyung Seo edited this article.
