I'm seeing K'Pop coming up with both the dating rumor and the term "K'Population" making the rounds again. For those who are unaware, both are inaccurate.
A few years back, Serin and I were the team that researched the group and investigated where the rumor/name came from. The episode I've linked explains it and provides sources, but here's the TLDR on these two matters.
K'Pop
K'Pop wasn't an abbreviation for K'Population. They debuted as K'Pop and went by that name until disbandment.
As stated during the group's Sugarman2 appearance, the name "K’Pop" was created by Joo Younghoon who produced the group. While on a business trip in Japan, he was inspired by the term “J-Pop” and came up with “K-Pop” as the Korean counterpart to the J-Pop wave. This was the first example of the term being officially used in Korean music, as previously the term for the genre we know today as K-Pop was referred to as Hallyu (한류) and/or Gayo (가요). This is why the music show Inkigayo is named as such, as the name literally means popular music.
Note: K'Pop is styled as such in English, but during promotions, they were also sometimes referred to as "K-Pop". Due to the genre using a hyphen, when referring to the group, an apostrophe is preferred to reduce confusion.
The first reference to K'Population that I found came from the long-defunct website http://kpophwaiting.net. It was an English fansite in the 2000s for the group, as K'Pop had international fans. I found Japanese fansites from 2002, and references to fans in the US.
On the front page of the kpophwaiting site was a notice that read the following: “K-Population is here for those K-Pop fans who do not speak Korean and may have a hard time finding things on the band.” From this, we see that "K-Population" wasn't used as the group's name at all, it was for a fansite.
Sidenote, in case you're wondering what K'Pop's fans were called, it was K’Popcorn (케이팝콘), which also went by the nickname Popcorn (팝콘).
I have no idea how K'Population got misconstrued as being the group's name on various English wikis years later. I assume it was due to general misinformation that was parroted over the years.
The Dating Rumor
From what I could gather, the original Korean and international K’Pop fans didn’t seem to be the source of the dating rumors.
The first mention of it I could find was from 2007, after the group had gone inactive (and technically disbanded) a few years prior in 2005. On January 22nd, someone made a Daum Cafe post saying they heard a rumor from their new friend that Woohyun and Youngwon had dated and broken up pre-debut. However, the poster themselves doubted it and seemed to want to share it because they thought it was funny. The commenters from that time also didn't seem to take it seriously either.
The fight between the two members from 2003 was brought up during this. The context for it being brought up was that the poster was musing about the idea of them fighting and they vaguely remembered Woohyun had bandages on his hands from an actual fight with Youngwon. They didn't claim the dating rumor and the fight were connected events.
For those of you who are unaware of the circumstances of that incident, here's a brief explanation. The group's coordinator was leaving, so the company had a farewell party for them. Prior to that, Youngwon's drinking habit of being rowdy was known to the group. He got drunk during the party, and around 3am Woohyun was fed up with Youngwon picking fights with him. While he was waiting for his ride, Youngwon came up behind him and punched him a few times before staff separated them. Woohyun had an injury to his face and his wrist, as he fell during the incident. (S) After multiple insincere apologies, Youngwon finally got it that he hurt his friend, so he publicly apologized to Woohyun for his actions and they both moved on. There were no further incidents publicly between them, and the group went on to release another album. Despite what people have spread around, the fight wasn't even close to being the reason why K'Pop disbanded -- it also didn't cause long-lasting discord between the members either, as we know from their later reunion.
However, it appears that didn't matter to the next person who spread this rumor. Also in 2007, a reporter wrote an article that acted as if the January post was a true summary of events. Although the article itself is lost to time, a fan's reaction to it was preserved. The fan was annoyed that the fight was brought up to drag the members. They also claimed that due to the reporter's reputation, they doubted the dating rumor was true. The fan's speculation about the article being written to bash the members wasn't unwarranted. For context, around that time, an article came out that discussed the morals of idols who trained/debuted while underage. Youngwon was mentioned in that article, as that reporter brought up the fight with Woohyun in it.
In 2011, the dating rumor article was brought up in conversation among netizens. They remembered the article, but forgot that they didn't take it seriously. So, the story got spread around again as if it was fact. This is why retractions are so important.
After K'Pop's appearance on SugarMan2, the dating rumor was spread to international fans through articles on sites like Koreaboo and Allkpop. To this day, you'll see people associating K'Pop with this rumor after a giant game of telephone.
Final Notes
When it comes to K'Pop, people know them more for two inaccurate pieces of info than anything else they actually did. If you read this whole post and are interested in knowing what the group actually did, I recommend listening to the podcast audio included at the top of this post. I hope I explained this well enough for people to get why 1st Gen fans have been cracking down on those who repost about K'Population and the dating rumor.
Please be cautious when looking at English language wikis for 1st Gen groups in general, as they tend to include wrong info (and generally don't list sources). For example, Baby V.O.X's entry on Kprofiles includes the wrong picture of the original leader (it shows a different member from an MV a few years after her departure) and doesn't list that she was the leader. Additionally, H.O.T's Wikipedia page is a DISASTER. So, be cautious, folks.
