In recent years, YouTube has gotten into touting the stats for its biggest music video debuts, specifically tracking which artists nab the most views within a 24-hour period and making public pronouncements via press releases and its social media channels.
Now, Bloomberg reports, the massively popular Indian rapper Badshah — whose real name is Aditya Singh — has obliterated the most recent record, though the video giant has thus far declined to credit him accordingly. Singh’s video for “Paagal” clocked 75 million views in one day, per Bloomberg, beating out Korean boy band BTS, whose clip for “Boy With Luv” ascended to the top spot with 74.6 million views in 24 hours last April.
Initially, Bloomberg reports, industry execs suspected that “Paagal” had been catapulted by fake views — via server farms and bots. However, the actual reason for YouTube’s silence is the fact that Singh and his reps had purchased ads that embedded or promoted “Paagal,” thus drastically increasing its view count.
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That said, Bloomberg notes that it has become common practice for major labels to buy YouTube ads upon the release of a new single — which, when watched for several seconds, are tallied as views. And while former record holders like Taylor Swift and K-pop group Blackpink have engaged in this promotional tactic, “Badshah just took it a step further,” the outlet reports, noting that Singh and his record label likely took advantage of the cheaper online ad rates in India. This incident, Bloomberg reports, has led YouTube to reevaluate the way that it judges music video viewership records.
A source familiar with the situation has also confirmed to Tubefilter that YouTube is evaluating the way that it reports records.
“We worked hard for this, promoted it worldwide,” Singh said in response to the fact that his achievement had not been recognized on Instagram, per Bloomberg. “I don’t want people abroad to see India like it’s shown in a film like Slumdog Millionaire. We are at par with the world. And it’s our time to shine.”
India is YouTube’s largest market, with 265 million monthly visitors, according to Bloomberg, as well as the home to the platform’s most-subscribed channel, T-Series.
