has social media affected modern kpop that much?

hello everyone! i am a relatively new kpop fan who has slowly been listening to groups to figure out what i like. ive listened to a few mainstream kpop songs in the past but i didn’t become interested in kpop until last year when dream academy released on netflix (im aware that katseye is not kpop but it was my first real introduction into the genre).

as an outsider ive always seen instances of hostile kpop fans online but after becoming immersed in the genre i was shocked to see how bad it was. this may sound dumb but as someone coming who has only really listened to western music i didn’t realize how negative and hostile fans could be at times and how idols are always under scrutiny for the smallest things. recently, i have been seeing videos of a lot of older artists (second gen i believe) doing interviews or interacting with idols of the opposite sex and it seemed “less polished” so to speak, like idols weren’t worried about doing things that could cause controversy like some of them are today. im aware that the industry/fan relationships back then probably weren’t perfect either and that my knowledge is very limited being that i am new. i guess my question is more of a kpop history lesson, what was kpop like before the rise of social media and how much has it changed from then to now? as a new fan my only knowledge of the idol-fan relationship is what i have seen up until now.