Former ADOR CEO Min Hee Jin appeared in court on November 11, stating that “verbal contracts are standard practice in the entertainment industry.”
That afternoon, the Seoul Central District Court’s Civil Division 62 held the third hearing for the ₩1.1 billion (approx. USD 800,000) damages lawsuit filed by ADOR against the production team Dolphiners Films. The case centers on YouTube videos related to NewJeans, which ADOR claims belong to the company but were uploaded by the production team without authorization.
The dispute began when ADOR questioned director Shin Woo Seok of Dolphiners Films about his authority to post NewJeans content on his own YouTube channel. Shortly after, Shin deleted all NewJeans-related videos from his other unofficial fan channel, Ban Heesoo Channel, leading fans who enjoyed the behind-the-scenes content to direct criticism toward ADOR.
ADOR argued that uploading the “ETA Director’s Cut” video on Dolphiners Films’s channel, which has 480,000 subscribers, instead of the official HYBE channel with 78.7 million subscribers, caused financial and reputational harm to HYBE and ADOR while benefiting Dolphiners Films.
Shin, on the other hand, claimed that ADOR’s public statement calling his upload “unauthorized” damaged his reputation and filed a separate criminal complaint for defamation. In response, ADOR filed this civil suit against him and his production team.
During the latest hearing, Min Hee Jin testified as a witness for the defense, marking her first appearance in court for a case unrelated to her own stock option dispute. Both sides focused on whether director Shin had legitimate rights to upload the videos and whether Min granted him special privileges during her tenure.
On the stand, Min stated that “it is common across the entertainment industry for music video directors to upload completed works to their personal social media or websites, rather than exclusively through the company’s official channels.”
She continued, “Uploading on personal channels helps generate promotional buzz. Respecting collaborators and their creative work is a basic principle.” Min added that it’s actually “harder to find cases with written contracts.”
Min elaborated further: “Formal service contracts often take too long to process and can’t be easily amended. The entertainment industry moves quickly, so these cases are quite common. Director Shin himself wasn’t satisfied with the written contract. In this industry, having a signed written agreement is actually unusual and even seen as strange.”
The ongoing legal battle between ADOR and Dolphiners Films continues to draw attention for its implications on intellectual property rights, production ethics, and the nature of creative collaboration in K-pop’s fast-paced environment.
Sources: nate