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A Rapper Ravaged By An Online Firestorm by npr staff.

Dan Lee goes by the name Tablo. He’s a rapper — hip hop, specifically — and one of Korea’s most famous artists. He’s also been at the center of a media storm, but not because of his music. His is a story of pop-culture paranoia and conspiracy.

Tablo burst onto the Korean hip hop scene around 2005 — young, handsome and just back from the U.S., where he went to college — at Stanford. He earned both bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English there, then decided to become a rapper.

“At the time, rap was not a very popular genre in Korea, but he decided to go back to where he was from, and try to produce hip hop music,” says Josh Davis, an editor at Wired Magazine who wrote about Tablo for a recent issue.

Tablo found some early success, not much at first, but by 2009 he’d started to gain traction. “He did a tour in the United States, and he sold out major venues in NY, in San Francisco, in Los Angeles,” Davis tells weekends on All Things Considered host Guy Raz.

“His album at that time was the No. 1 album on the U.S. iTunes hip hop charts,” Davis says. “It was topping Jay-Z and Eminem, so he was really on the verge of something.”

That attention skyrocketed when he married a top Korean film star. The celebrity couple burned headlines onto Korea’s entertainment sites, like a Korean version of Jay-Z and Beyonce.

Tablo was at the top of the world, but then, about a year ago, it all fell apart.

From Rumor To Firestorm

Someone began making accusations against Tablo on an Internet forum.

“And on this forum, anonymous individuals started posting information, saying Lee had stolen somebody’s identity, had lied about his Stanford degree, was not in fact a Stanford graduate, had basically fabricated this entire persona, all with the aim of becoming an international hip hop star,” Davis says.

The accusation stuck.

“Within a number of weeks, hundreds of thousands of members signed up to this forum and demanded that Tablo reveal the truth,” Davis says.

There were a few things that seemed suspicious about Lee’s story, like completing both undergraduate and master’s programs at Stanford in three and a half years — an extraordinary feat. Lee released his Stanford transcripts and diploma publicly, but that didn’t end the matter.

“It only exacerbated the controversy,” Davis says. “It basically fed food to the fire. They then zeroed in on the diploma and they looked for the exact placement of every comma on the diploma to see whether or not in fact it was a forgery. And then they charged him with forgery when they said they felt there were discrepancies.”

Koreans are wary of Ivy league claims; in 2007 a curator at a Seoul art museum got her job with a fake Ph.D from Yale. Tablo was now suspect, Davis says, and his story began to dominate celebrity news in Korea.

“It affected his career, it affected his life,” Davis says. “He couldn’t go out on the streets, because people were starting to threaten him.”

Lee’s record sales plunged. He parted ways with his label; he felt they didn’t do enough to defend him. And because he was among Korea’s most recognized celebrities, he couldn’t leave his home without being harassed.

“He became a hermit at age 29,” Davis says.

Tracing The Rumor Back To Its Source

At that point, Stanford University itself contacted Davis and asked him to investigate the source of the malicious accusations. The trail soon narrowed.

“I found a number of posts from an individual online claiming to be a cousin, a relative of Dan Lee,” Davis says. The purported cousin accused Tablo — in detail — of lying about his academic credentials.

“This occurred right before the creation of the forum that then blew up into a larger deal, that took over the attention of the country,” Davis says, “so it seemed curious to me.”

As Davis scrolled back to the initial posts on the forum, he saw that the accusations were based on the alleged cousin’s claim.

“I saw people saying ‘Look, here’s a relative,’” Davis says. “‘If a relative thinks it, then it really must be true.’”

Except it’s still not clear whether that person actually was a relative, or a jealous friend, or someone who simply wanted to ruin Lee’s career.

‘Fever’s End’

It took more than year before Korean tabloids began to come around on Lee and accept that he wasn’t lying and that he had, in fact, graduated from Stanford. Most people believe Lee’s story now, Davis thinks.

“The evidence is so strong in his favor that you’d really have to have a strong sense of conspiracy to not believe him at this point,” Davis says.

Earlier this month, 12 people who posted false accusations online were put on trial in Korea for criminal defamation against Tablo. They could face jail time.

Meanwhile, Tablo has recorded a new album about his ordeal, named Fever’s End. It’s put him right back at the top of the charts, but after such an experience, he’s still not ready to perform publicly again.

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Tajinyo Says It Can’t Trust the Court

Source: ENEWSWORLD.COM

Translated by : Erika Kim

It seemed as if the Tajinyo case will come to a swift conclusion with the arrival of Tablo’s official papers, but the Tajinyo members won’t be giving up without a good fight.

After the papers proving Tablo’s academic records arrived from America, the accused Tajinyo members have been put on the defensive. They’re not ruffled, however, as they even continue to voice suspicions against the justice department.

On May 18, a member of Tajinyo posted some suspicions under the title ‘Why the trial wasn’t clean’. The member, with nickname kiwi****, said in the post, ‘The judge in charge of the case and Tablo’s lawyer used to attend the same Judicial Institute. That’s why we can’t trust the results.’ The member also added that the producer of the MBC special Tablo Goes to Stanford and the judge both went to the same high school and university.

The post was put on the main page of the café, and received much support from the members with over 4,000 views. The members promptly started to spread the suspicions by gathering together personal information and photos of the judge, lawyer and producer.

Suspicions also arose regarding the trial held on May 18.

This day, Tablo withdrew his suit against two of the accused, who pleaded for lenience. The reason was that “they asked for forgiveness and didn’t attack [Tablo’s] family.”

Tajinyo, however, again rose to say Tablo’s withdrawal was an attempt to cover up his own faults. The same post revealed that ‘Professor Kwak Keum Joo and some who showed their support for Tablo turned out to be members of [the same church]. We can’t trust them because Tablo’s family also goes to the same church.’

The member even demanded that ‘now that the official diploma has arrived, the head of the criminal investigation section of Seocho in charge of the Tablo case should reveal the immigration records from the police investigation.’

Despite the fact that Tajinyo still holds its head up high, the café is mostly expected to go downhill in the future. Some of the accused are even breaking off from the group, pleading leniency soon after the papers proving Tablo’s academic credentials arrived.

The public are now looking toward how the case will come to a close after two years of chaos.

icaruswalksnet:

Tablo’s Original Papers from America Confirmed

Source: ENEWSWORD.COM

Translated by: Erika Kim

Tajinyo, the internet café that has continued to push suspicions regarding Tablo’s academic credentials, is in for a rude awakening.

The official documents proving Tablo’s academic history have arrived from America.

The justice department revealed in the hearing held on May 18 that the documents proving Tablo’s academic background have arrived from the related institutes, including those from Stanford University.

The justice department said, “The originals of Tablo’s diploma and acceptance letter from Stanford University, his SAT and AP records, etc. have all arrived from the related institutes, just as the accused (Tajinyo) had requested. We have also finished our examination of the papers.”

As such, Tajinyo’s side of the story has lost a great chunk of its credibility.

The Tajinyo members refused to approve some of the evidential documents and asked for Tablo to be brought into court, but the justice department dismissed the requests.

The prosecution also added a charge of contempt on top of the original charges for libel against Tajinyo.

In April 2011, Tajinyo had requested Tablo’s original diploma and acceptance letter from Stanford University, leading the justice department to ask Stanford University for the documents in June of the same year.

They expected the documents to arrive in six months and so scheduled the next trial to take place in December, but it was pushed back when the papers failed to arrive.

Now that the documents are here, however, the case is expected to go swiftly. The next hearing will take place on June 8.

http://icarus-walks.net/index.php?mid=News&document_srl=10897

icaruswalksnet:

Tablo’s interview with F.OUND Magazine
Source: F.OUND Online
Translated by: Emily@icarus-walks.net
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It was the end of November when I met with Tablo. When I sat down with him, that month, he had already released his solo album “Fever’s End,” and had participated in interviews on music programs and with major media outlets, but what I was most interested in wasn’t the story that everyone wanted to hear. “So far, the interviews I’ve done have been short. I haven’t been able to explain fully. I didn’t have anything to say because there are many cases like mine, but the interviewers kept looking for my answers. If there’s something you want more, you have to have control.” At that moment, as an editor with an open heart, for the first time in my life I worried that the interview might not be possible. But at the same time, I was hopeful that even Tablo, who had compulsive self-protective instincts built up from that storm-like time, would be willing to give me the full story.