Another of Korea’s four major digital music providers has followed CJ E&M’s lead in removing “recommended” songs, amid controversy over the market distortions caused by such music curation services.

KT Music said Tuesday it would remove recommended songs from its digital music service Genie within the year, and continue to discuss improvements for fairer digital music services.

“If the music industry works together to correct the distortions in the digital music market caused by the recommended song function, the market will change more quickly to a system where music producers and service providers can both win,” Hong Sang-wook, head of KT Music, said in a statement.

Last month, CJ E&M’s digital music service Mnet.com announced that it would remove recommended songs from its chart service to prevent giving those songs biased exposure and streaming revenue. Recommended songs were displayed at the top of each music service’s charts, making them more readily available to play.

Melon and Bugs Music, the other two digital music providers in the top four, have promised improvements to make their services fairer, while stopping short of pledging to eliminate their song curation services.

By Won Ho-jung (hjwon@heraldcorp.com)