About a week ago, we wrote about fans urging YouTube, BIGHIT MUSIC, and Geffen Records to restore BTS V‘s deleted YouTube topic channel. While this wasn’t an “official” YouTube account and the members of BTS don’t have individual accounts on the platform, YouTube does have auto-generated individual “topic” channels for each BTS member. At the time that it was deleted, V’s topic channel had around two million subscribers.
It’s unclear why the topic channel was deleted, and in its place, a new channel was created that had drastically fewer subscribers, leading fans to ask YouTube and V’s labels to restore the original account. It was especially frustrating considering this was around the time that V was releasing and promoting “FRI(END)S”.
Hello @TeamYouTube@YouTube@youtubemusic
BTS V’s youtube generated Artist V Topic channel has been deleted with more than 2M subscribers. PLS fix the issue ASAP and restore his 2M Subscribers.
RESTORE V TOPIC ON YOUTUBE
RESTORE 2 MILLION SUBSCRIBERS@BIGHIT_MUSIC @bts_bighit pic.twitter.com/hr3zTb7Er8— V태뷫V
FRI(END)SⓋ
Layo(ꪜ)er
TAECREW
(@SN119_THV_CT79) March 13, 2024
Fortunately, thanks to the effort of ARMYs, the topic account was restored and has once again been listed as the official topic on the BANGTANTV YouTube channel.
But now, yet another problem has resurfaced regarding V that has fans once again upset and frustrated with how the BTS member appears to be neglected by his label.
When the original topic account for V was deleted, an impersonation account had been created that wasn’t run by BIGHIT MUSIC. It started to become a highly searched topic when fans were looking for V’s content, and fans were asking for the issue to be resolved. However, not only was the impersonator not condemned by BIGHIT MUSIC, but the label, presumably unknowingly, ended up promoting the channel through their own official accounts.
While the account originally only had a couple hundred subscribers, the promotion of the channel led to it reaching over 200,000 subscribers.
The promotion is still up on BTS’s BIGHIT MUSIC social media accounts, despite demands from fans to have it removed.
Thank you YouTube for the support! Create a Short with “FRI(END)S” now on #YouTubeShorts!
https://t.co/T9LKN3dZ10#V #뷔 #V_FRIENDS #FRI_END_S pic.twitter.com/rTEzXrcwgc
— BTS_official (@bts_bighit) March 21, 2024
WTF
Is there anyone left with a minimum of professionalism in hybe???
Put the right fucking linkhttps://t.co/lA6azNRFOk https://t.co/rlmboa16Tw
— kth2601_FRI(END)S
How disgusting that you even post the WRONG link that we’ve been requesting you to remove. YouTube have confirmed that all these problems are fully in your hands to fix! I hope V sues you f out of you when he gets out!!!
https://t.co/tjOykSiga6
— KTH Tae Crew (@KTHTaeCrew) March 21, 2024
Not y’all linking a fake channel that is impersonating Tae & that we are currently struggling to take down!
https://t.co/v7SR8TkUKF
— thꪜibe
ⓥ (@scorpionsclaw) March 21, 2024
they always hav their nugu mode on when tae is releasing something
https://t.co/sJtCZEFUrX
— ń • (@velinekafka) March 21, 2024
isn’t linking the fake channel that’s impersonating him a little too much? see what happens when you don’t give a fck about your artist and you do everything on your behalf to ruin every project https://t.co/Aeawcv0mMy
— fri(end)s official manager (@kthvord) March 21, 2024
According to many fans, they feel that V has been poorly treated and promoted by BIGHIT MUSIC for some time, and that this is just the latest in a series of incidents that negatively impact his career. On a forum post about the topic, some of the comments got pretty heated and critical of the label and their latest blunder.
BIGHIT MUSIC has not released a statement regarding the issue at this time.