Highlights, photos from K-pop concerts to be released online: agency

SEOUL (Yonhap) - Highlights and photos from upcoming Korean pop music concerts in France will be made available on the Internet for a global audience, a South Korean talent agency said Wednesday.
S.M. Entertainment, which has scheduled concerts for its main acts for this Friday and Saturday in Paris, said it will upload highlights of the performances to its YouTube channel (www.youtube.com/smtown). The agency will also upload the latest photos of popular groups such as TVXQ and Super Junior on S.M.'s Facebook page. (www.facebook.com/smtown), the agency added.
An S.M. official explained the online activity as a way to meet the demands of its international fans.
"After we scheduled the Paris shows, fans across Europe and South America held rallies asking for concerts in their countries," the official said. "Our Facebook page has been flooded with messages from fans in the U.S., Mexico, Australia and Italy, and so we wanted to give them a chance to share the fun this time."
S.M. had initially scheduled a show for only this Friday at Le Zenith de Paris concert hall, which seats about 6,000, but later added another date for Saturday. Tickets for the first show sold out in 15 minutes, prompting hundreds of French fans to rally in front of the Louvre Museum to call for an extra show.
The concerts will feature Girls' Generation, Super Junior, TVXQ, SHINee and f(x), all of them popular girl groups or boy bands who have enjoyed a recent surge in international fame.
Korean pop music, branded "K-pop," has gained worldwide popularity through video-sharing Web sites such as YouTube and social networking services (SNS).
The S.M. tour stopped previously in Seoul, Los Angeles, Tokyo and Shanghai and will return to Tokyo in September this year.