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Fans who sell goods related to celebrities and earn big money are attracting attention.
Known as a "homepage master," or "hom-ma" in Korean, the fans take pictures of their favorite star and use them to make goods such as calendars, photo albums, T-shirts, cheering props, character dolls and even underwear. They put the goods on their homepage or SNS sites for sale.
According to the Hankook Ilbo, a young woman bought a high-quality camera and computer software with her first paycheck to become a homepage master of a celebrity. She advertised online a placard designed with a K-pop boy band member's photo that she took. She received about 100 orders, making 500,000 won ($414).
Boy bands Block B and EXO and girl band Girls' Generation each have tens of Twitter followers or bloggers who are dedicated to taking photos and videos of their favorite stars and posting them online.
Girl band f(x)'s Choi Jin-ri, whose stage name is Sulli, is known for a particular homma who had been following her, taking photos and posting online
But some homma are targets of entertainment agencies that regard the fan goods as a violation of the stars' copyright. The homepage masters do not pay the agencies fees for the copyright. But the agencies cannot take any legal action because that might attract fans' criticism.
One agency told the Hankook Ilbo they could do nothing when a fan bought an airline ticket for a seat next to a celebrity and kept photographing the star.
The homma are also attracting authorities because they do not pay tax on the income from the goods. The homma who do not register their business or report their income to the government could face action for tax evasion, authorities said.
