New Jeans, a group that insisted on the termination of its exclusive contract with its agency Adore, recently opened SNS, raising the possibility of changing the team name.
On the 14th, New Jeans opened a new SNS channel called "jeanzforfree" and posted an image of a rabbit, a symbol animal, wearing a cone hat to send a happy birthday message to former CEO Min Hee-jin. Earlier, they performed at a concert in Korea by the Japanese mixed group Yoavo without directly mentioning the team name, which some analyzed as a measure to avoid unnecessary legal disputes with their agency, Adore.
However, with the opening of the "Jeans 4 Free" channel on that day, some speculated that the New Jeans might be trying to make a new start under the name "New Jeans," which changed only one letter from the team name. There is also a view that it chose an easier and faster solution of renaming to "Newzins" rather than dragging the trademark dispute for a long time.
In this regard, Newzins has not officially announced its name change to 'Newzins'. If so, would they actually have legal effect if they chose to rename it 'New Jeans'? In conclusion, it is a common opinion among legal experts that it is impossible to act as 'Newzins' under the trademark law.
Kim Tae-hwan, an intellectual property expert at law firm Daeryun, told YTN, "First of all, trademark rights related to New Jeans belong to Adore Inc. In addition to the English mark, Odor did not apply for trademark rights for the Korean mark "New Jeans," but "New Jeans" is also likely to be judged as an infringement because the identity and similarity of the title are important criteria for judgment."
Attorney Kim then said, "In general, if Newzins is a 'third party' that is not related to Ador, infringement is likely to be recognized if Ador claims trademark infringement. It seems necessary to further check whether Newzins used this name without any worries or decided to use it with hidden intentions.
He also paid attention to a lawsuit filed by Adore to confirm the validity of the exclusive contract. Attorney Kim said, "If Dorr wins, Newzins will become singers belonging to Audor, so the issue is whether they can be viewed as 'third parties' in claims of trademark infringement. On the contrary, if the exclusive contract is confirmed to be invalid, the Newzins members will appeal that their existence was a measure taken to prevent them from being unable to work for a long time due to a long legal battle.
In particular, lawyer Kim said, "If Newzins loses the above confirmation lawsuit, if he is confirmed to belong to Adore, he should go back as a singer. If he continues his activities despite the ruling, he will have to pay a huge penalty for violating his contract as a singer, he said. "Addor can also claim a ban on activities on exclusive contracts, so he will not be able to perform as a singer based on legal judgment."
As such, Newzins is taking the step of legally deciding whether to terminate the exclusive contract through an emergency press conference, activities after the conference, and rumors of a team name change due to the opening of a new SNS channel. When will New Jeans, who is walking a tightrope even to watch, be able to return as an "idol" again?
[Picture = Dorr]
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