Samsung’s S20 Launch Briefly Flashes BTS, Sending K-Pop Fans Wild

K-pop fans love their K-pop, and there’s no bigger K-pop band than BTS. And while Samsung didn’t roll the Korean supergroup out during their Galaxy S20 launch this morning, one of the members did appear on stage in background shots, which has naturally set the fanbase alight.

The snippet of BTS happened halfway through the Samsung Unpacked stream, with Kim Tae-hyung – better known by his stage name V – popping up in the background during a general wrap. Tae-hyung wasn’t part of the S20 launch in any meaningful way, and the image wasn’t part of anything cool about the new phones, but the mere presence of the K-pop star, naturally, set fans into a frenzy.

Samsung hasn’t announced any specific affiliation with the K-pop band, but fans had already noticed – because of course they did – that the group had switched phones recently. There were other clues looking towards a possible deal, with Samsung Galaxy users getting a special app for CONNECT, BTS, a free art exhibit running concurrently in New York, Seoul, Buenos Aires, Berlin and London.

Samsung has rolled out plenty of influencers for their phone launches before. Ninja was deployed during the Note10 launch to showcase Fortnite on the phone, which was a big deal at the time. But Ninja’s still just an influencer in the realms of gaming – he might have mainstream appeal, but nowhere near the level of appeal as BTS.

The K-pop group had been on hiatus, but announced at the start of the year that their comeback album, Map of the Soul: 7, would be released on February 21. It’s certainly not the worst tie-in for a new phone.


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