MelOn, one of the biggest music distribution sites in South Korea has given their warning against ‘sajaegi’ on their site.
The company that owns and manages MelOn, Loen Entertainment has released a statement with the title, “Requesting Cooperation for the Eradication of Sajaegi.”
Their statement reveals, “Our company reveals through this statement our regret and concern over the manipulation of charts; since we worry about the unfair cases of external companies asking money from each music agency in return for manipulating the operation of music charts. We would lead the way by taking caution.”
“We are taking steps to block or limit the service of IDs we observe to have weird patterns when purchasing the rights to access and memberships. We would also filter data in order to stop any abnormal attempts from ruining the fairness and the transparency of the music charts,” they continue.
It was also mentioned in the statement that they would be taking legal action against companies suspected of ‘sajaegi.’ They also reveal, “After consulting with the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism regarding the general guideline about sajaegi, we have the right to exclude the related sales and number of usages from our calculations.”
A representative Loen Entertainment also reveals, “You could think of this as an extremely strong warning. Chart manipulation was possible since we could only lessen our loses through calculations at a later time. However, now that we have blocked it, there would be a decrease in the companies which take part in sajaegi.”