ADOR won even in the fight with Dolphiners Film.
On Jan. 13, the Seoul Central District Court civil division 62 (presiding judge Lee Hyun-seok) partially ruled in favor of ADOR in the damages lawsuit ADOR filed against director Shin Woo-seok and Dolphiners Film, ordering Dolphiners Film to pay ADOR 1 billion won.
The court recognized 1 billion won of ADOR's 1.1 billion won damages claim that was filed for breach of contract. However, the court dismissed the 100 million won claim filed against director Shin Woo-seok personally.
Earlier, in Aug. 2024 Dolphiners Film posted the director's cut of NewJeans' "ETA" music video on its own YouTube channel, and NewJeans' agency ADOR said the video was published without consultation and that it was illegal.
At the time ADOR said the director's cut of "ETA" that Dolphiners Film posted on its own SNS channel was an edited version that included parts the advertiser had disagreements with and was posted without consultation with the advertiser, and it pointed out that the copyright for NewJeans' music video and all related works belongs to ADOR under the contract with Dolphiners Film, so they should be posted on ADOR's official channels.
After the unauthorized posting controversy surfaced, Dolphiners Film deleted not only the video in question but also the NewJeans videos it had posted on its unofficial fandom channel "Banhui-su channel." Director Shin Woo-seok also said ADOR requested the deletion of the related videos.
However, ADOR rebutted that it only requested the removal of the director's cut of "ETA" and did not request the deletion or stopping of uploads of all NewJeans-related videos such as those on the Banhui-su channel, and said director Shin was spreading false information.
As several position statements were exchanged, director Shin filed a complaint saying ADOR's statement that he had "unauthorizedly disclosed (the director's cut)" damaged his reputation, and ADOR filed a damages lawsuit against Dolphiners Film saying it was illegal to publicly post NewJeans videos owned by the company without permission.
After the trial began, the two sides clashed in four hearings. In particular, at the third hearing in Nov. last year, former ADOR CEO Min Hee-jin testified as a witness and said there had been an oral agreement that it was commonly allowed in the industry for a music video director to post a video on their own SNS.
But the court did not accept that. It judged the contract to be more important than the "oral agreement" directly testified to by former ADOR CEO Min Hee-jin. In the end, Dolphiners Film was ordered to compensate ADOR 1 billion won.
Meanwhile, ADOR also won the plaintiff ruling last year in the suit seeking confirmation of the validity of exclusive contracts filed against the five NewJeans members. Consequently, members Haerin, Hye-in and Hanni decided to stay with ADOR, and Min-ji is also in discussions with ADOR.
However, ADOR notified Danielle that it was difficult for her to continue together and terminated the exclusive contract, and ADOR also said it would hold legally responsible one member of Danielle's family, who bore significant responsibility for NewJeans' departure and delayed return, and former CEO Min Hee-jin.
[photo] OSEN DB
[OSEN]