Within 24 hours of posting his video Paagal to YouTube, Indian rapper Badshah broke a record even Taylor Swift couldn’t touch. The clip, a dancehall romp, was seen 75 million times in one day, eclipsing a mark set by Korean boy band BTS in April.
But then a funny thing happened: YouTube declined to credit the Sony Music artiste. Since introducing a new way to premiere videos last year, the Google-owned site has trumpeted the setting of every new record, from Ariana Grande’s thank u next to Blackpink’s Kill This Love, culminating in BTS’s Boy With Luv. It even said Swift’s ME! set a record for “most-viewed female solo debut”. But Badshah’s feat elicited no response from the world’s most popular online video hub.