Viki’s platform allows users to sort by “On Air,” “Complete,” or “Coming Soon,” indicating an awareness that this distinction matters. If you wait a week, another episode has aired and you’ve missed the vote and the conversation. This is because Kingdom: Legendary War is the kind of program that encourages appointment viewing. As of the time of this writing, Viki’s Kingdom: Legendary War episodes were available to stream with subtitles in 29 different languages, but the bulk of the audience who will watch it probably already has. Episodes became available shortly after their airing on Korea’s MNet, with English-language subtitles added to the videos within 2-3 days. Earlier this year, Viki was the main legal international destination for Kingdom: Legendary War, a Korean music competition program that featured six popular K-pop boy bands battling it out through live performance. Meanwhile, Viki has a tab specifically devoted to variety programming. While major U.S.-based streamers like the aforementioned have begun to expand their offering of Korean dramas, they don’t seem as interested in variety shows or other reality content from Korea and other East Asian countries. shut down Dramafever in 2018, the company cited “business reasons” happening “in light of the rapidly changing marketplace for K-drama content.” (As reported by Todd Spangler in Variety, a show that used to cost $800,000 to license for streaming now goes for around $1 million per season, which has made it more expensive for a streamer to curate a wide selection of Korean dramas.) Where Viki might have an edge on platforms like Netflix, Prime, or even Apple+ (which is busy working on its first Korean-language content) is in diversity of genre. The marketplace for K-dramas and other East Asian content has become increasingly competitive in the past few years, especially since Netflix properly entered the game in 2016. Though Viki’s largest subscription base is in the U.S., the platform’s translators have added subtitles to its content library in approximately 150 languages. (Side note: pay for your labor, Viki.) “A drama can translate into 20 different languages within 24 hours,” Makoto Yasuda, Rakuten Viki’s chief operating officer, told AP News recently, adding that there is a waiting list of volunteer translators for the most popular dramas. Viki has built its business and brand on its community of fan translators, who volunteer to provide subtitles for the streamer’s expansive catalogue of content, sometimes extremely quickly. It has more than 1,700 TV shows and movies on offer to its 55 million users. (Dramafever’s closure, which hit the international K-drama fan community hard, also impacted Hulu’s K-drama offerings, as the streamer was a licensing partner with Dramafever.) Currently, Viki offers a tiered subscription model, as well as a free, ad-supported option. Following the abrupt closure of competitor Dramafever by parent company Warner Bros in 2018, Viki scooped up a lot of that platform’s K-drama content. In 2013, it was acquired by Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten. Viki has been around since 2007, when it was launched as a streaming platform for international TV. If you’re a longtime watcher of K-dramas or C-dramas, then you probably already know and use Viki, but if you’re relatively new to the world of foreign-language entertainment, then let me illuminate you… British drama fans have Acorn TV and BritBox for when they’re looking to dip below the basic offerings of a mainstream streamer (mainstreamer?), and fans of East Asian content have Rakuten Viki, a California-based company that specializes in original and licensed content from Japan, Korea, China, and Taiwan. Platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime, or HBO Max can be a good one-stop shop for your media needs, but if you’re a fan of East Asian media and are looking for a deeper library of content, then there are more focused platforms in which to consider investing your time and money.
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