The dispute between ADOR and Dolphiners Films reached a critical point at the fourth hearing held on December 9, 2025, at the Seoul Central District Court, where testimony from former ADOR CEO Min Hee-jin and director Shin Woo-seok laid bare the logic behind their defense.
ADOR is seeking 1.1 billion KRW in damages, alleging that the unauthorized upload and handling of NewJeans’ “ETA” music video breached contract, violated IP and brand obligations, and caused reputational harm. Dolphiners Films and Shin Woo-seok have countersued for defamation, with Min Hee-jin appearing in court to support their position.
Across testimony, Min and Shin framed the conflict not as a question of contractual breach, but as a misunderstanding rooted in creative custom, trust-based authority, and informal industry practice—an approach that now sits in direct tension with ADOR’s argument that governance failures, not creative differences, are at the heart of the case.
Their arguments have followed several consistent lines:
Verbal approval as “industry standard.”
Both Min and Shin argued that verbal agreements are commonly accepted in K-pop production, especially in fast-moving creative environments, and that written confirmation was not always treated as essential.
Blanket creative authority based on trust.
Min testified that she fully trusted Shin Woo-seok and granted him broad discretion to act in what he believed was the project’s best interest, including decisions related to edits, uploads, and presentation.
Uploading to Dolphiners’ channel as a creative strategy.
Min stated she allowed the “ETA” director’s cut to be uploaded to Dolphiners’ YouTube channel because she believed it would generate intrigue and buzz, criticizing HYBE’s distribution approach as overly rigid and creatively dull.
Failure to review the contract.
Min acknowledged that she did not read the relevant contracts in detail, relying instead on working relationships and precedent rather than formal legal terms.
Brand-removal misunderstanding (Apple).
Shin Woo-seok explained that he deleted a scene explicitly naming Apple but did not realize all brand references needed to be removed, saying the requirement was not clearly understood at the time.
No final approval sought from ADOR.
Shin said he did not seek final confirmation from ADOR before uploading the video because he believed the former CEO’s blanket approval remained valid, even after leadership changes.
ADOR’s current CEO countered these claims directly, telling the court that she uncovered multiple governance failures after taking office and argued that being a “creative” or content creator does not excuse ignoring contracts, approvals, or brand obligations.
Together, these defenses frame the dispute as a clash between informal creative culture and formal corporate governance—a line of argument that has drawn intense scrutiny as the court moves toward a ruling.
POSSIBLE “PLAY”
As the hearings progressed, what stood out was not only the substance of Min Hee-jin’s defense, but the evolution of her posture. Her testimony moved from initially dismissive—treating contractual formality as secondary to creative intuition—to openly condescending toward HYBE’s systems, which she characterized as rigid, bureaucratic, and creatively uninspired. By the later stages of testimony, however, that tone gave way to a series of internal inconsistencies, most notably her admission that she did not read the relevant contracts in detail.
That admission carries particular weight. From a legal standpoint, failure to read a contract is not a defense; intent aside, contractual obligations remain binding. It is widely understood that Min’s legal team would be well aware of this, which has led many observers to interpret her testimony less as an attempt to justify legality, and more as a strategy to establish lack of malicious intent.
By repeatedly emphasizing trust, precedent, verbal custom, and misunderstanding—rather than defiance—her statements appear calibrated to distance her actions from willful misconduct. In other words, the argument being constructed is not “this was allowed,” but rather “this was never meant to cause harm.” Such framing may be significant not only for the current civil damages claim, but also in insulating against potential future criminal exposure, where intent becomes a far more central threshold.
In that sense, the courtroom narrative has shifted. What began as a clash between creative freedom and corporate governance has increasingly become a case study in how defendants attempt to reframe authority failures as cultural misunderstandings. Whether the court accepts that framing—or treats the admissions themselves as confirmation of governance breakdown—will ultimately determine how much weight creative custom can carry when set against written contracts, brand obligations, and IP control.
