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“Legalweek, The Experience” 2017 is One Week From Today!: eDiscovery Trends

What is “Legalweek, The Experience”, you say?  LegalWeek is LegalTech New York, along with six other “events-within-an-event” that will be going on next week in New York at the New York Hilton Midtown, starting next Tuesday, January 31 and concluding on Thursday, February 2.  Let’s take a look at some of the sessions and events worth particular note for eDiscovery professionals.

Several Tracks Dedicated to eDiscovery: There is at least one educational track each day devoted to eDiscovery, with Forward Thinking in eDiscovery on Tuesday, The Challenges of Cross-Border eDiscovery and Ediscovery Everywhere on Wednesday and E-Discovery’s New Frontiers on Thursday.  So, there are plenty of eDiscovery related sessions during the conference (and at least three different ways to spell eDiscovery apparently).  There are also at least a couple of tracks related to Information Governance (IG) and Cybersecurity (Data Security and Governance on Tuesday and 2017: Information Governance Challenges and Solutions on Thursday).  So, there are plenty of interesting sessions to check out.

Tuesday Highlights: At 12:45pm, the session EDRM & NOT eDiscovery? looks intriguing – the panelists apparently apply the EDRM framework to non-discovery related challenges such as data migration and company mergers, acquisitions and divestitures.  Another interesting session is at 2:15pm (eDiscovery, the Cloud & Beyond) which looks to discuss IG and litigation readiness for data in the cloud.

I would be remiss if I didn’t also mention that CloudNine and ACEDS is hosting Drinks with Doug (that’s me!) and Mary (as in Mary Mack, Executive Director of ACEDS!) at Ruth’s Chris Steak House at 148 West 51st Street on Tuesday from 4:00pm to 6:00pm.  It’s a “PowerPoint free” event to hang out with other conference attendees over a drink.  Space is filling up, but you can still RSVP here if you’ll be at the show and want to attend.  Come join us!

Wednesday Highlights: At 9:00am, the session The Effects of the December 2015 Amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure from 3 Perspectives (Judges, Defense & Plaintiff), with panelists like Judges Peck, Rodriguez and Laporte, as well as some notable law firm panelists seems like a can’t miss opportunity to get insight as to how the 2015 Rules changes have impacted discovery.  With recent developments in international discovery privacy laws, The Data Privacy Landscape: Emerging Laws Affecting Cross-Border Discovery at 10:30am should be a good look at a quickly changing landscape.

Thursday Highlights: For those who think eDiscovery is only about litigation, consider attending the 10:30am session E-Discovery for Investigations and Criminal Matters to learn more about its expanding role in new areas of law and corporate governance.  And, it’s always interesting to see thought leaders predict the future, which is what will happen at The Future of e-Discovery Law, Business, and Practice at 2:00pm.

Exhibit Hall: Of course, the largest legal technology conference of the year wouldn’t be complete without an extensive list of exhibitors.  This year, according to my count, there are 182 exhibitors (which is actually a few more than last year, reversing a slide in the number of exhibitors since 2013).  One thing which will be interesting this year: for the first time “Exhibits-Plus” passes are not free like they have been in previous years – it now costs $45 to get into the State of the Industry Address, Keynotes, Emerging Technology and Super Sessions and, of course, the Exhibit Hall (still a lot for the money).  Nonetheless, it will be interesting to see how the first-time cost will affect attendance at the show and the Exhibit Hall.

As always, we will cover the show here at eDiscovery Daily, including a list of eDiscovery and IG related sessions each day.  Check here for the sessions you may want to check out at the conference!

So, what do you think?  Are you attending LegalTech, er, LegalWeek next week?  Please share any comments you might have with us or let us know if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

(The) Winter (eDiscovery Business Confidence Survey) is Coming: eDiscovery Trends

Winter is Coming!  And, by “winter”, I mean the Winter 2017 eDiscovery Business Confidence Survey created by Rob Robinson and conducted on his terrific Complex Discovery site.  It’s the second year of the quarterly survey and we covered all four rounds of the survey last year (those results are here, here, here and here).  Now, it’s time for the Winter 2017 Survey to start a new year!

As before, the eDiscovery Business Confidence Survey is a non-scientific survey designed to provide insight into the business confidence level of individuals working in the eDiscovery ecosystem. The term ‘business’ represents the economic factors that impact the creation, delivery, and consumption of eDiscovery products and services.

This year’s survey consists of nine multiple choice questions focused on factors related to the creation, delivery, and consumption of eDiscovery products and services and may be useful for eDiscovery-related business planning.  It’s a simple nine question survey that literally takes about a minute to complete.  Who hasn’t got a minute to provide useful information?  As always, individual answers are kept confidential, with the aggregate results to be published on the Complex Discovery blog upon completion of the response period, which goes through Tuesday, February 28.

The more respondents there are, the more useful the results will be!  What more do you need?  Click here to take the survey yourself.

Now that we have entered a second year for the survey, we can start to evaluate year over year results to differentiate those variations from quarterly fluctuations.  Knowledge is power!

So, what do you think?  Are you confident in the state of business within the eDiscovery industry?  Share your thoughts in the survey and, as always, please share any comments you might have with us or let us know if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Image Copyright © Home Box Office, Inc.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Looking Back at Predictions That I Made Three Years Ago: eDiscovery Predictions Revisited

Sometimes, in addition to the many other resources that I use to look for blog post ideas, I like to look back at my old posts from the past to see if there’s a topic that warrants a fresh look.  When I did that yesterday, I stumbled on two posts that comprised six eDiscovery predictions for 2014 that I wrote three years ago.  I thought it might be fun to look back at those posts to see how those predictions fared.

Here are the six predictions that I made back then:

Prediction 1: Predictive coding technologies will become more integrated into the discovery process, for more than just review.

Prediction 2: The proposed amendments will be adopted, but it will be a struggle.

Prediction 3: The eDiscovery industry will continue to consolidate and many remaining providers will need to continue to reinvent themselves.

Prediction 4: Data security will be more of an emphasis than ever, yet we will continue to see more data breach stories than ever.

Prediction 5: Small to medium sized law firms will need to leverage virtual resources more than ever to compete.

Prediction 6: Educating attorneys on eDiscovery best practices will continue to be a slow, painful process.

Let’s take a look at them, one by one:

Prediction 1: Predictive coding technologies will become more integrated into the discovery process, for more than just review.

Well, we have all been perhaps a little optimistic and maybe a bit overzealous on the pace of adoption of predictive coding technology, maybe even more so with its application to other areas besides review.  And, according to Gartner, machine learning (the technology behind predictive coding) is at the Peak of Inflated Expectations.  So, we’re probably a bit behind where I thought we would be at this point.

Nonetheless, there have been strides.  The Information Governance Initiative launched in February 2014 (after my predictions, I might note – I had no advance intel) with a mission of “sounding a call to arms that current information practices are unsustainable in our increasingly big data world, and that IG solutions exist that better leverage new technology and smart practices”.  And, we’ve certainly seen a greater emphasis on data discovery recently (prior to litigation related legal discovery).  So, it’s happening, just not as quickly as I expected.

Prediction 2: The proposed amendments will be adopted, but it will be a struggle.

As we know by now, the proposed amendments were adopted, in December 2015.  That may seem like a no brainer now, but it wasn’t back at the beginning of 2014.  There was lots of debate over controversial Rule 37(e), which addresses sanctions for spoliation.  Eventually, Rule 37(e) was amended (not once, but twice) and the Rules amendments proceeded through the adoption process fairly smoothly the rest of the way.  Now, “intent to deprive” is perhaps the key phrase to determine whether sanctions will be assessed (and, if so, how severely).  So, I think I got that one right.  :o)

Prediction 3: The eDiscovery industry will continue to consolidate and many remaining providers will need to continue to reinvent themselves.

Are you kidding me?  This one has clearly come to pass.  According to my calculations (from Rob Robinson’s list of mergers, acquisitions and investments on Complex Discovery), there have been 110 transactions since the start of 2014 (sure, some of them are investments, but there are a lot of acquisitions and mergers as well).  Here are a few names that have been acquired or merged over that time: Applied Discovery, Recommind, Huron Legal, Orange Legal Technologies, Content Analyst, D4, Daegis, Kiersted Systems, Brainspace, Equivio, EQD and Kroll Ontrack.

As for the reinventing themselves, the automation revolution in eDiscovery is clearly forcing some providers to change their focus toward SaaS automation.  OK, maybe it seems like this was an easy one to predict, but in 2014, not everyone was seeing a clear trend toward consolidation in the industry.  I don’t hear anybody debating that point today.

That was so fun that I think I’ll save the last three predictions for tomorrow!  Stay tuned.

So, what do you think?  Has eDiscovery evolved like you thought it would?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

REAL CLE Credit and Also a Bit About FAKE Lawyers: eDiscovery Trends

These are two totally unrelated topics, by the way.

Last week, when I wrote about whether this is the age of technical competence for attorneys, I also referenced our webcast on Wednesday, January 25th at noon CT (1pm ET, 10am PT) titled What Every Attorney Should Know About eDiscovery in 2017 via the BrightTALK network.  This is a one-hour session that Karen DeSouza (Director of Review Services here at CloudNine) and I have conducted for the past couple of years for hundreds of legal professionals for CLE credit in Texas.  It’s a good fundamental session that covers key terms, the eDiscovery life cycle, rules, duties, and case law which can give you tools and resources necessary to efficiently and effectively meet challenging discovery obligations that you’ll face this year.

At the time, I indicated that we were working on CLE credit for at least some states.  I’m happy to announce that we now have CLE approval for two states: Texas and Florida.  The Texas approval is 1.0 hours of CLE credit, with 0.25 hours of Ethics credit.

The Florida approval is for 1.0 hours of CLE, with 1.0 hours of Technology CLE credit.  As you’ll remember, Florida late last year mandated three hours of technology CLE for attorneys over a three year period, starting January 1 of this year.  So, if you’re in the Florida Bar, this an opportunity to get one of those hours!

Click here to register for the webcast.  Hope to see you there (at least digitally) on the 25th!

Also…

In the latest post in his excellent LawSites blog (What’s With These Fake Lawyer Blogs and Twitter Accounts?), Bob Ambrogi mentions that he has “five very loyal followers of this blog. Three are lawyers, one is a legal secretary and one is a legal assistant.”  According to Bob, these particular followers reblog “everything” Bob posts onto their blogs and Tweet some of what he posts on their Twitter feeds and are loyal followers of other blogs, as well.

The only problem is that none of them appear to be real people.  Bob noticed the issue when, recently, all five separate blogs “started reposting everything” he posts and they “always do it in unison, within a minute or two of each other”.  He also noted that all five blogs use essentially the same page layout and nearly identical list of links to their other supposed social media accounts.

With a little snooping and some help from Google image search to search for the pictures displayed on their Twitter accounts, he has found that one has matched an endodontist named John Smith (who may or may not be real, as well) and another to someone who has a profile on a personals site.  The name for neither of them ties to an actual attorney currently licensed to practice in their supposed state.

I clicked on the link to the Twitter account of the first “lawyer” that Bob mentioned.  While I didn’t see any Tweets of Bob’s posts, I did see several posts from Kevin O’Keefe’s excellent blog, Real Lawyers Have Blogs.  Oh, the irony!

So, what do you think?  Where do you go for legal technology content?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Is This the Age of Technical Competence for Attorneys?: eDiscovery Trends

Last year, I led off the year with a post declaring that the age of eDiscovery automation is upon us (even with an exclamation point for emphasis!).  Was that the case?

Well, in the past year (or so), we’ve seen an even more broad acceptance of Technology Assisted Review (TAR) with the first UK case law to approve the use of TAR.  Sure, there is still some dispute about the technology and acceptance of TAR (and sometimes how it is presented), and the machine learning technology at the core of TAR may be at the “Peak of Inflated Expectations”, but it’s clear that TAR is here to stay, even as the technology and approaches around it evolve.

With regard to SaaS automation technology, we’ve seen significant investment by venture capital firms in providers like Logikcull and Everlaw and we’ve also seen “big boys” like kCura, Ipro and Thomson Reuters make significant SaaS and automation announcements.  Not to mention the emergence of other SaaS automation providers like CloudNine (you knew I’d mention us in there somewhere, right?).  With the continued evolution of TAR technology (and acceptance of that technology) and the emergence of SaaS automation alternatives, it’s clear that automation is already changing the eDiscovery landscape in a big way.  And, that doesn’t even consider the growing impact of automated data discovery prior to litigation, which is another trend that I think you’ll see have a significant impact on the market in the coming years.  So, I was right.  ;o)

However, for automation technology to really have an impact, the users of that technology need to really understand that technology and its benefits and we’ve discussed numerous times on this blog how attorneys are lacking in their understanding of technology.  This thought has been reinforced by many of the thought leaders we’ve interviewed over the years who have discussed how disappointed they are with the rate of adoption of technology by the legal industry.  In particular, Craig Ball likened it to the melting of the glaciers, then observed that, because of global warming, the glaciers might be melting faster than attorney adoption of technology.  Will lawyers ever “get” the technology?

Maybe they’re finally being forced to do so.

In 2012, the American Bar Association formally approved a change to Model Rule of Professional Conduct 1.1 to clarify that attorneys not only have a duty to be competent in practice of law, but also in technology with Comment 8 to the rule which reads: “To maintain the requisite knowledge and skill, a lawyer should keep abreast of changes in the law and its practice, including the benefits and risks associated with relevant technology, engage in continuing study and education and comply with all continuing legal education requirements to which the lawyer is subject.” {emphasis added}

Then, in 2015, California adopted Formal Opinion 2015-193, which stated that “[a]ttorney competence related to litigation generally requires, among other things, and at a minimum, a basic understanding of, and facility with, issues relating to e-discovery”, noting that an attorney lacking the required e-discovery competence must either learn it, consult with someone who knows it or decline the client representation.

Now, over half of the states – at least 26 in all – have adopted some requirement (or at least guidance) for technical competence by attorneys.  And, we now have our first state – Florida – which late last year actually mandated three hours of technology CLE for attorneys over a three year period, starting January 1 of this year.  Will that start a new trend of states requiring technology CLE?  We’ll see.

Regardless, it’s clear that the trend is toward more and more states expecting licensed attorneys to have some level of technology competence.  As my boss likes to say, “you can get on the bus, or get run over by the bus”.  (Yep, I know I used that statement last year when discussing adoption of automation technology – I guess I need to get some new material…)

With that in mind, it’s important to stay on top of best practices and trends regarding technology in the legal industry to meet your state’s technology competence requirement.  Your state may not currently have such a requirement, but (based on recent trends), it could be coming.  One way to do so is via reading, so if you’re a regular reader of our blog, congratulations!  You’re already doing something to boost your technology competence level by learning about eDiscovery best practices, trends and key case law decisions.

Another way is through training and CLE events, either in-person or via webinar, where you can learn about technology and possibly satisfy your CLE requirements (even if you don’t live in Florida).

To help in that endeavor, CloudNine is sponsoring a webcast on Wednesday, January 25th at noon CT (1pm ET, 10am PT) titled What Every Attorney Should Know About eDiscovery in 2017 via the BrightTALK network.  This is a one-hour session that Karen DeSouza (Director of Review Services here at CloudNine) and I have conducted for the past couple of years for hundreds of legal professionals for CLE credit in Texas.  It’s a good fundamental session that covers key terms, the eDiscovery life cycle, rules, duties, and case law which can give you tools and resources necessary to efficiently and effectively meet challenging discovery obligations that you’ll face this year.

To sign up for the webcast, click here.

I should note that we are currently working on CLE accreditation for the webcast in at least a couple of states and I will provide updates on this blog as we obtain approval for each state.  Regardless, it’s a terrific overview of eDiscovery concepts and I hope you’ll join us.

So, what do you think?  Do you think we’re finally entering an age of technical competence for attorneys?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Here’s Where You Can Get a Complete List of eDiscovery Events for 2017: eDiscovery Trends

How many eDiscovery related events are happening in 2017?  You might be surprised as to how many there are, but, the good news is that you can get a complete list of them below.

Thanks to Rob Robinson’s terrific Complex Discovery site, you can get a “non-comprehensive” list of planned eDiscovery-related industry events for 2017.  From The Sedona Conference Working Group 11 Annual Meeting for 2017, later this month on January 16 & 17 in St. Pete Beach, FL to the third annual E-Discovery Day on December 1 (like it was the last two years), there are at least 43 total events scheduled for this year.

Here’s a few highlights:

  • LegalTech 2017 (now part of LegalWeek, The Experience) will be held at the New York Hilton from January 31 thru February 2. As usual, eDiscovery Daily will be there and we are planning to conduct our seventh annual thought leader interview series at LTNY again this year!
  • ABA Techshow 2017 will be held at the Chicago Hilton on March 15 thru 18.
  • The Spring EDRM Workshop will be held at the Duke Law School (in Durham, NC) from May 15 to 17.
  • The Masters Conference is scheduled to be held in five venues this year: San Francisco on April 25, Chicago on May 23, Denver on June 20, New York City on July 18 and Washington DC on October 23.
  • ILTACON 2017 is scheduled to be held in Las Vegas from August 13 thru 17. Vegas baby!

As you can see, there’s a lot to look forward to this year.  Make sure you get credit for all of those frequent flyer miles!

So, what do you think?  Which events are you planning to attend this year?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Missed the eDiscovery Business Confidence Webinar? Here is Where You Can Still Check it Out: eDiscovery Trends

It’s a rare two post day for us here at eDiscovery Daily.  To check out the other post today, click here.

On Wednesday, ACEDS hosted a webinar (sponsored by CloudNine) where we discussed results from the Fall 2016 eDiscovery Business Confidence Survey, which was conducted last month with the results published on Rob Robinson’s terrific Complex Discovery site.  Did you miss it?  Here’s where you can still check it out.

During the one hour presentation and discussion led by ACEDS Executive Director Mary Mack and me, the expert panelists discussed the results of this quarterly survey, breaking down the results within different response groups (e.g., providers, law firms, corporations, etc.) and compare the results of this survey to those of past surveys to discuss changes in trends. Participants in the webinar included the following eDiscovery leaders:

  • George Socha, Co-Founder of EDRM and Managing Director at BDO Consulting;
  • Eric P. Mandel, Managing Member at Indicium Law PLC and Member of the Board for LTPI;
  • Zach Warren, Editor in Chief of Legaltech News;
  • David Horrigan, E-Discovery Counsel and Legal Content Director at kCura;
  • Jennifer Johnson, Vice President at Commonwealth RICOH

If you want to check out the webinar and/or download a copy of the slides, click here.  And, look out for the Winter 2017 survey coming to the Complex Discovery site in January!  Of course, we’ll remind you when it’s live, so no worries… :o)

So, what do you think?  What’s your state of confidence in the business of eDiscovery?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Today’s the Day to Hear Experts Comment on the State of eDiscovery Business Confidence: eDiscovery Trends

Last week, we covered results from the ACEDS and Complex Discovery Fall 2016 eDiscovery Business Confidence Survey, which was conducted last month with the results published on Rob Robinson’s terrific Complex Discovery site.  There’s even a Canadian breakdown (which sort of sounds like Canadian bacon when you say the words out loud) here.  Today, you can attend a webinar to hear experts comment on the results of the survey and their thoughts about the state of eDiscovery business in general!

This time, there were 113 total respondents to the survey, which is over 100 respondents for the second straight quarter.  Continued sponsorship from ACEDS and promotion from EDRM, strong>LTPI, Masters Conference, kCura and Women in eDiscovery and new Canadian sponsor Commonwealth Legal (not to mention us here at CloudNine) has helped continue to keep the number of respondents high.

At 1:00 pm ET today (12:00 pm CT, 11:00 am MT, 10:00 am PT), ACEDS will be hosting the webinar (sponsored by CloudNine) regarding the survey.  During this one hour presentation and discussion led by ACEDS Executive Director Mary Mack, expert panelists will share and discuss the results of this quarterly survey. The discussion will feature eDiscovery leaders including:

  • George Socha, Co-Founder of EDRM and Managing Director at BDO Consulting;
  • Eric P. Mandel, Managing Member at Indicium Law PLC and Member of the Board for LTPI;
  • Zach Warren, Editor in Chief of Legaltech News;
  • David Horrigan, E-Discovery Counsel and Legal Content Director at kCura;
  • Jennifer Johnson, Vice President at Commonwealth Legal

And me, of course.  We will not only take a look at this survey in general, we will also break down the results within different response groups (e.g., providers, law firms, corporations, etc.) and compare the results of this survey to those of past surveys to discuss changes in trends.

Click on the link here to register for the webinar.  Hope to see you there!

So, what do you think?  What’s your state of confidence in the business of eDiscovery?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

It May Be FALL, But eDiscovery Business Confidence Is On The RISE: eDiscovery Trends

The results are in from the ACEDS and Complex Discovery Fall 2016 eDiscovery Business Confidence Survey, which was conducted last month and (as was the case for the Winter, Spring and Summer surveys) the results are published on Rob Robinson’s terrific Complex Discovery site.  How confident are individuals working in the eDiscovery ecosystem in the business of eDiscovery?  Let’s see.

As always, Rob provides a complete breakdown of the latest survey results, which you can check out here.  So, to avoid redundancy, I will focus on trends over the past four surveys (for the most part) to see how the responses have varied from quarter to quarter.

Again this quarter, I’ll be participating in a panel discussion webinar moderated by Mary Mack of ACEDS with George Socha of BDO Consulting, Eric Mandel of Indicium Law, Zach Warren of Legaltech News, David Horrigan of kCura and Jennifer Johnson of Commonwealth Legal also participating as panelists where we will discuss these trends and others.  Click here to register for that webinar.

Over a Hundred Respondents Again: This time, there were 113 total respondents to the survey, which is over 100 respondents for the second straight quarter.  Continued sponsorship from ACEDS and promotion from EDRM, strong>LTPI, Masters Conference, kCura, Women in eDiscovery and new Canadian sponsor Commonwealth Legal (not to mention us here at CloudNine) has helped continue to keep the number of respondents high.

Canadians Are People Too: Speaking of Canada, one change from past surveys was to break out the Canadian responses from the US responses in the results, where nearly twenty percent (19.5%) of the respondents were from our neighbors to the north.  Oh, Canada!  Rob broke out the Canadian responses here.

Respondents Still Diverse, But Slightly Less So: Of the types of respondents, 57 out of 113 were either Software and/or Services Provider (33.6%) or Consultancy (16.8%) for a total of 50.4% of respondents as some sort of outsourced provider (just over half of total respondents).  Law firm respondents were still in a strong second place with 28.3%.  Corporation respondents was the only other category over 10% this time.  Here’s a graphical representation of the trend:

fall2016-1

Over Half of Respondents Consider Business to Be Good: Over 56% (56.6%, to be exact) of respondents rated the current general business conditions for eDiscovery in their segment to be good, with 6.2% rating business conditions as bad.  Last time, those numbers were 47.6% and 13.7% respectively.  Does this reflect a seasonal dip during the summer – the only quarter where less than half of the respondents were bullish on business?  We’ll see.  Here is the trend for the four quarterly surveys this year:

fall2016-2

Almost Everyone Still Expects eDiscovery Business Conditions to be as Good or Better Six Months From Now: Almost all respondents (94.7%) expect business conditions will be in their segment to be the same or better six months from now (slightly down from last quarter’s 97.0%).  Revenue (also at combined 94.7% for the same or better) and profit (combined 89.4%) were improved over last quarter.  Here is the profits trend for the four quarterly surveys this year:

fall2016-3

Increasing Volumes of Data is Clearly Considered to be the Most Impactful to eDiscovery Business: Increasing Volumes of Data (33.6%) was clearly considered to be the most impactful to the business of eDiscovery over the next six months, followed by Budgetary Constraints (a distant second at 24.8%).  Increasing Types of Data (15.9%) rose to third, Lack of Personnel and Data Security (both at 9.7%) tied for fourth and Inadequate Technology (6.2%) dropped back to dead last (where it has been in all but the last survey).  The graph below illustrates the distribution across the four quarterly surveys this year.

fall2016-4

The clearly notable trend here is the continued rise in the importance of Increasing Volumes of Data.  With data doubling in organizations every 1.2 years, it’s clear that the issue of data discovery is becoming more important than ever.

Continued Increase in “Rank and File” Responses: Last time, we noted a virtual even split among type of respondents (based on role), with Executive Leadership, Operational Management and Tactical Execution almost an even split.  The latter two categories continues to rise, at 73.5% of total respondents (with Executive Management down to 26.5%, less than half of the first two surveys).  Here’s that breakdown, quarter by quarter:

fall2016-5

Canada Even More Bullish: Across the board, the respondents from Canada were even more confident in the state of eDiscovery business than the group overall.  As an example, here are the expectations for revenue for the next six months for all respondents and for Canadian respondents:

fall2016-6

Rob has published the results on his site here, which shows responses to additional questions not referenced here.  Check it out.

So, what do you think?  What’s your state of confidence in the business of eDiscovery?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Evolution of eDiscovery Automation – Looking Back and Looking Forward: eDiscovery Trends

How has eDiscovery automation technology evolved over the years?  Where is it headed?  What is the current state of acceptance for Technology Assisted Review (TAR) within courts and within the bar?  How do the different TAR approaches work?  Has the promise of TAR been fulfilled?

Those are just a few of the questions presented and discussed last Thursday in our E-Discovery Day webcast 10 Years Forward and Back – Automation in eDiscovery which was presented by ACEDS and sponsored by CloudNine.  If you missed the webcast, you’re in luck – the webcast was recorded!

Moderated by Mary Mack, Executive Director of ACEDS, the webcast highlighted the progress of eDiscovery automation technology over time and took a look at the present state of the technology and where it could be headed.  Speakers included:

  • George Socha, Co-Founder of EDRM and Managing Director at BDO, who turned on the “wayback” machine to look at the evolution of eDiscovery technology for well more than ten years back (more like 30 when the term “eDiscovery” didn’t even exist yet) and took a look forward toward what to expect for the future;
  • David Horrigan, E-Discovery Counsel and Legal Content Director at kCura, who discussed the evolution and current state of acceptance of TAR by courts and within the bar;
  • Bill Dimm, Founder and CEO of Hot Neuron, who discussed what we’ve learned about improving TAR technologies and how to effectively measure results, as well as how each of the most common TAR approaches work;
  • Bill Speros, Principal of Speros & Associates, who discussed the current state of the practice of TAR and whether TAR (and machine learning technology in general) is currently living up to its promise or it has reached the peak of inflated expectations.

I spoke as well about factors that are driving practitioners and providers alike toward discovery automation technology, the evolution of that technology to where we are today and whether any of the current automation technologies has the potential of becoming a disruptive innovation that revolutionizes how discovery is conducted.  The panel also addressed several questions from the audience over the course of the 90 minute session.

The webcast was well attended with several of the attendees rating the webcast as “Excellent” and a number of them commenting that the webinar was very informative and provided excellent information about the use of TAR and the history of eDiscovery technology.

Now is your chance to find out if you agree.  Below is the video recording of the webinar.

You can also check it out here and also download a PDF copy of the slides (though I should note that many of the slides have animations, so the best way to get the full effect is to watch the video).  Feel free to drop me a line and let me know what you think.

So, what do you think?  Did you attend an E-Discovery Day event?  Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscovery Daily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscovery Daily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.