Former administrative officer Kim Seon-tae, famous as ‘Chungju Man’, has launched a personal YouTube channel. Screen capture from the YouTube channel ‘Kim Seon-tae’

From ‘Chungju Man’ to ‘Kim Seon-tae’, former administrative officer Kim Seon-tae has signaled a full-throttle run as an independent YouTuber.

On the 2nd, Kim Seon-tae opened a personal YouTube channel bearing his own name, ‘Kim Seon-tae’, and on the following day, the 3rd, he released his first video titled ‘This is Kim Seon-tae’, announcing a full-fledged return to activity. In particular, he drew attention by speaking candidly in the video about the background of his resignation.

First, he dismissed misunderstandings about his departure, saying, “It looked as if I was being driven out, but not at all.” He went on, “People were criticizing the civil servants of Chungju City too much and even all civil servants, and it hurt my heart. I know it comes from a place of support, but it isn’t a problem with the public sector,” adding, “I was absolutely not ostracized; many people helped me.”

As for the reason for leaving, he frankly drew attention by saying, “As a promoter, I did as much as I could. With around one million subscribers, I had done my duty,” and, “I wanted to work more freely. That’s why I decided to do YouTube. Isn’t this the only thing I can do? The biggest reason was that I wanted to earn more money.”

Former administrative officer Kim Seon-tae, famous as ‘Chungju Man’, has launched a personal YouTube channel. Screen capture from the YouTube channel ‘Kim Seon-tae’

After joining Chungju City in 2016 as a Grade-9 civil servant, Kim built nationwide recognition from 2019 by running the city’s official YouTube channel, ‘Chung TV’. Handling everything alone from planning and booking to shooting and editing, he rolled out bold content that blended his signature ‘B-grade sensibility’ with the latest memes, earning reviews that he completely rewrote the rules of local-government publicity.

Thanks to these efforts, ‘Chung TV’ set a milestone as the first local-government YouTube channel to surpass 900,000 subscribers, and in 2024just seven years after his appointmenthe was rapidly promoted to Grade 6, emerging as an icon of innovation in the civil service.

However, he shocked the public last month by announcing his sudden resignation. Various speculation and controversy erupted online. In particular, employee communities raised allegations of in-organization envy and jealousy and even a ‘bullying’ rumor, causing ripples. It also became known that abusive words targeting him appeared among related search terms on Chungju City Hall’s intranet, prompting a wave of criticism of the rigid organizational culture in the public sector.

Former administrative officer Kim Seon-tae. Appearance on JTBC’s ‘Knowing Bros’

In addition, reports that he had received a job offer for the Cheong Wa Dae Secretary for Digital Communications position fueled public debate.

Putting all the gossip behind him, Kim returned with his personal channel and showed tremendous impact. As of the 4th, just two days after launching the channel, subscribers had surpassed 640,000, and views on the first video also topped 2.8 million.

The key will be whether he can sustain this buzz. According to the channel description, the concept is “We promote everything in the world,” and attention is on what content he will roll out. With just the launch and the first video, the ‘Kim Seon-tae’ channel has already cleared the Silver Button threshold. All eyes are on whether he will quickly reach the one-million-subscriber Gold Button and prove that ‘Kim Seon-tae’ has become a brand in his own right.