LOONA Boycott

In 2022, LOONA's fandom known as "Orbit" staged a boycott against their entertainment label Blockberry Creative (BBC). This was done in response to member Chuu being expelled from LOONA, and the following revelation that the group was operating under a unfair contract, wherein the members were not earning money, but stuck in perpetual debt.Full English Translation by Team Subbits (Google Docs)Tweet, by adamntual. Also see repost on Reddit, called BBC Contract Explained All twelve members had filed for provisional injunction to suspend their contracts, citing a breach of trust, therefore entering into a lawsuit with their company.Daum "JTBC shares 9 members of LOONA members excluding Vivi and Hyunjin have filed an injunction against BlockBerry Creative to terminate their contracts" (KR) - English Translation by Team Subbits
To aid LOONA, the fandom staged a boycott against all commercial products, including albums, merchandise, tickets and more.Tweet by Union LOONA (KR and ENG) Fans openly pirated all of LOONA's music, to prevent any profit. LOONA Union was created to organise efforts between both international and domestic fanbases. They wrote letters demanding response from BBC. Fans also contacted various K-Pop stores to prevent stocking of albums, with over 240 K-Pop stores worldwide offering support.🔥ongoing thread of kpop businesses that will not be stocking loona’s newest comeback in support of the boycott (1/?) on Twitter
It was a successful boycott. Due to low sales, the company indefinitely postponed LOONA's upcoming album.English Translation On June 16 2023, it was reported that all remaining members of LOONA had won the lawsuit and terminated their contracts.Naver article (KR) - English Translation The members left the company, re-debuting in Loosemble and ARTMS, while Chuu and Yves pursued solo careers.
== Background ==
=== Blockberry Creative ===
Blockberry Creative, commonly shortened to BBC, is the entertainment agency for LOONA, formed in 2016. In the early years of the fandom, they were beloved and highly regarded by fans. For example, a fan comment in 2018:
This would change in the succeeding years due to a myriad of reasons including significant hiatuses (dubbed "loonathedrought" by fans), mismanagement, staff departures - most notably creative director Jaden Jeong, and various financial difficulties, most notably a lawsuit from investor 'Donuts'. This led to rumours that LOONA was disbanding, resulting in the viral #SaveLOONA trend. 
=== Chuu's Absence ===
== Boycott == 
=== LOONA Union ===
Fans had spoken about a boycott in response to Chuu's departure, but no immediate widespread action was taken. Some fans gathered and created an initial survey nicknamed "Loona Fanbase Action" to garner interest in a possible boycott. This was posted on December 30 and ran for 5 days. Some snippets from the survey:
File:LOONA Boycott Survey 1.png 
File:LOONA Boycott Survey 2.png
File:LOONA Boycott Survey 3.png
The result of this survey was the creation of LOONA Union described as an "joint response team of domestic and foreign fanbases". On December 4, LOONA Union releases their first official statement:
A day later, this was followed with an official statement, on behalf on the fandom, from LOONA Union, demanding an official statement from Blockberry Creative. If no statement was received, the union would announce a boycott. It is generally believed that LOONA Union was responsible for starting the boycott.When did LOONA the Boycot start on r/LOONA
The statement was supported by a large number of Orbits, but received some criticism, for it's wording, having an unreasonable deadline, inclusion of the world tour and more.Response to statement on Reddit There was no response from Blockberry Creative. As promised, the collective released a statement on December 8, declaring the boycott:
As noted by The Michigan Daily, the fanbase had effectively unionized similar to that of a traditional labor protest.
=== Music Streaming ===
To prevent the label from gaining profit from streams on platforms like YouTube or Spotify, fans would engage in piracy and repost all content on different platforms. For example, fan translation group Team Subbits held an archive of all music videos, behind the scenes, and variety content like LOONA TV. Fans also uploaded all music videos to Google Drive and circulated links. A well-known resource was loonatherepost, a site made to share "boycott resources".loonatherepost
The official Spotify account for LOONA 1/3 was hacked, with it's description replaced with a note urging fans to boycott:
The hacker also reposted various LOONA's songs under a fake Spotify account called "twelveM". They received a takedown request for the "Flip That" album by Warner Music Group.Tweet by thetwelvemoons Besides this, much of the reposts still remain, becoming a verified account, and as of 2024, receiving over 32.2k monthly listeners.Spotify account for twelveM Yeojin has even used the twelveM version of the song "Rosy" on an Instagram post.Instagram post by Yeojin
Fans have also tried other ways to circumvent the Spotify system. For example, some fans used the local files feature to listen to LOONA's music.Twitter thread by @MuRkYrULEz Other fans have reuploaded the songs as podcasts.LOONA PODCAST DISCOGRAPHY ALL SONGS BOYCOTT on Spotify Many of these are often titled with "boycott ver."[https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6xvEaU20Yv8L6Ul3hPJs4u LOONA (boycott ver.) Both of these strategies will successfully prevent BlockBerry Creative from receiving any profit from streams, but allow for fans to listen to LOONA's music on Spotify.
According to loona stats, over the course of the boycott, the group received a -73.2% decrease in Spotify streams.LOONATHEBOYCOTT infographic on Twitter
=== Unfollowing Social Media ===
Fans mass unfollowed many of the social media accounts associated with LOONA, such as Instagram, Twitter and more. For example, @loonatheworld on most platforms, or the agency's account @blockberrycreative_official. On Twitter, loonatherepost was created. This account reposted all official tweets from the loonatheworld account, allowing fans to access them while unfollowing the main account.loonatherepost
According to loona stats, LOONA lost over -577k followers across all social media platforms combined.
== Response from LOONA ==
In an interview with Nylon, JinSoul comments on the boycott:
In a Bubble livestream, Haseul comments on the fan petitions. The following is summarised notes by fan translator Litell_Johnn:
== Aftermath ==
=== Loona Independence Day ===
The LOONA members were granted suspension from their contract on different dates. However, by June 16, 2022, all twelve members were granted contract suspensions and left Blockberry Creative. This day, June 16, has since been celebrated in the fandom as "Loona Independence Day".[https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=loona%20independence%20day Loona Independence Day
== Further Reading ==
* LOONA’s betrayal: A story about the power of K-pop fans by Katelyn Sliwinski (The Michigan Daily)
== References ==
Category:Activism
Category:LOONA
Category:2022 Events
Category:2023 Events