Netizens are expressing outrage over a last-minute decision made by 'KGMA.'

The newly launched award show, which held its first installment over the past two days, has come under fire for its controversial voting system. The category in question is 'Best Hip-Hop,' where BTS' J-Hope was leading in the fan vote with a commanding margin.

J-Hope not only topped the charts for one award but led decisively in two originally: 'Best Hip-Hop Artist' and 'Best Hip-Hop Song,' securing over 70% of the votes in both categories.

However, just five days before the ceremony, 'KGMA' abruptly announced a rule change, merging the two awards into a single category.

To the shock of many, the award also went to Lee Young Ji, who was in 6th place with only 0.508% of the votes.

Although the official criteria stated that the winner would be determined based on 20% judges' evaluation, 45% streaming/album sales/media points, and 35% fan votes, netizens were baffled by how this could result in Lee Young Ji overtaking J-Hope, given the overwhelming gap in the fan-voted category.

What upset fans the most was that they were required to pay to cast their votes. For two months, fans said they devoted their time and money to ensure a fair outcome, only to feel disregarded.

One netizen voiced their frustration, saying, "If [KGMA] were just going to ignore all the fan votes and give the awards to whoever the judges wanted, they should have done that from the start. The KGMA completely disregarded the fans who spent two months of their time and money to vote for the top spot."

Currently, hashtags like "#KGMAUnfair" are trending in both Korean and English on X, as fans continue to dispute the award results.

Reactions include:

"So they just held an awards ceremony as a cash grab."

"There’s more than one victim here."

"They deserve to be sued. What they’re doing is infuriating."

"What’s with combining the nominees last minute? This makes no sense—it’s baffling."

"And it’s paid?!"

"Extorting money from fans—this is straight-up gangster behavior."

"No wonder the fans are upset. Ugh."

"Why even bother accepting votes, especially paid ones?"

"I’ve never seen an awards show with paid votes that didn’t end in betrayal."

"The fact that they accepted all those paid votes and then pulled this off is unbelievable."

"I’m honestly about to cry."

"What was the point of voting? The fans are the only ones who suffer."

"Sure, they can create a new awards show and give awards however they want, but then they shouldn’t have collected months of paid votes."

"Then they shouldn’t have accepted votes in the first place. This is ridiculous."

"If they wanted to give awards however they wanted, they shouldn’t have held paid votes."

"Was this just opened to make money?"

"Why bother accepting votes if they’re going to hand out awards however they want? It’s so absurd, lol."

"They want the money but also want to give awards as they please? What kind of ridiculous awards show is this?"

"If they didn’t plan to reflect the votes, then they shouldn’t have charged fans for them. This is straight-up extortion."

"They have official criteria and even state the voting percentage, but they just ignored all that and did whatever they wanted? Is this a joke? And this was a paid vote? What even is the basis for awarding?"

"What’s going on? It’s not just the votes; other metrics show a big gap too."

"The winners were already decided. What a bunch of scammers."

"Both J-Hope and Youngji deserve their awards, but doing this after opening paid voting is just wrong."

What are your thoughts on this controversy?

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