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I Removed a Virus, Did I Just Violate My Discovery Agreement? – eDiscovery Best Practices

As we discussed last month, working with electronic files in a review tool is NOT just simply a matter of loading the files and getting started.  Electronic files are diverse, they can represent a whole collection of issues to address in order to process them for loading, and processing them effectively requires a sound process.  But, what if the evidentiary files you collect from your custodians contain viruses or other malware?

It’s common to refer to all types of malware as “viruses”, but a computer virus is only one type of malware.  Malware includes computer viruses, worms, trojan horses, spyware, dishonest adware, scareware, crimeware, most rootkits, and other malicious and unwanted software or program.  A report from 2008 stated that more malicious code and other unwanted programs was being created than legitimate software applications.  If you’ve ever had to attempt to remove files from an infected computer, you’ve seen just how prolific different types of malware can be.

Having worked with a lot of clients who don’t understand why it can take time to get ESI processed and loaded into their review platform, I’ve had to spend some time educating those clients as to the various processes required (including those we discussed last month).  Before any of those processes can happen, you must first scan the files for viruses and other malware that may be infecting those files.  If malware is found in any files, one of two things must happen:

  • Attempt to remove the malware with virus protection software, or
  • Isolate and log the infected files as exceptions (which you will also have to do if the virus protection software fails to remove the malware).

So, let’s get started, right?  Not so fast.

While it may seem logical that the malware should always be removed, doing so is technically altering the file.  It’s important to address how malware should be handled as part of the Rule 26(f) “meet and confer” conference, so neither party can be accused of spoliating data when removing malware from potentially discoverable files.  If both sides agree that malware removal is acceptable, there still needs to be a provision to handle files for which malware removal attempts fail (i.e., exception logs).  Regardless, the malware needs to be addressed so that it doesn’t affect the entire collection.

By the way, malware can hit anybody, as I learned (the hard way) a couple of years ago.

So, what do you think?  How do you handle malware in your negotiations with opposing counsel and in your ESI collections?   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 Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

July Pop Quiz Answers! – eDiscovery Trends

Yesterday, we gave you a pop quiz for the topics we’ve covered in the past month.  If you’re reading the blog each day, these questions should be easy!  Let’s see how you did.  Here are the answers.

 

1.  In Cottle-Banks v. Cox Commc’ns, Inc., the plaintiff’s motion for spolation sanctions was denied because:

 

A. The defendant didn’t have an obligation to preserve the call recordings

B. The defendant didn’t have a culpable state of mind

C. The plaintiff was unable to show that the deleted recordings would have been relevant

D. None of the above

 

2.  How can you ensure that Word’s smart quotes won’t disrupt your search with garbage characters?

 

A. Disable the automatic changing of quotes to smart quotes in Word

B. Perform a “find and replace” of smart quotes to regular quotes in a text editor

C. Copy the word doc into a text editor, then convert to ASCII

D. All of the above

 

3.  Which of the following is NOT a proportionality factor in the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure, as spelled out in PTSI, Inc. v. Haley?

 

A. The total net worth of the producing party at the time the case was filed

B. The nature and scope of the litigation, including the importance and complexity of the issues and the amounts at stake

C. The relevance of electronically stored information and its importance to the court’s adjudication in the given case

D. The ease of producing electronically stored information and whether substantially similar information is available with less burden

 

4.  Which proposed Federal rule to be amended would require that courts allow discovery that is “proportional to the needs of the case”?

 

A. Rule 26(b)(1)

B. Rule 26(b)(2)(C)(iii)

C. Rule 37(e)

D. Rule 37(b)(2)(A)

 

5.  In which case were the parties disputing whether an eDiscovery vendor could work for both sides in the same case?

 

A. Lazette v. Kulmatycki

B. Gordon v. Kaleida Health

C. Harry Weiss, Inc. v. Moskowitz

D. Hart v. Dillon Cos

 

6.  How many times has the EDRM Talent Task Matrix been downloaded since it was introduced in January?

 

A. Less than 250

B. More than 250, but less than 500

C. More than 500, but less than 1,000

D. More than 1,000

 

7.  Which of the following is NOT a challenge when producing documents?

 

A. Courts and opposing counsel are increasingly demanding ‘native file productions’

B. Native files can be altered (either intentionally or not)

C. Native files don’t provide enough metadata

D. Native files cannot be redacted

 

8.  Which of the following is a problem that needs to be addressed to review electronic files?

 

A. Image only electronic files such as TIFF or image-only PDF files have no searchable text

B. Outlook Emails require processing to break them out into individual files

C. In almost every collection, there are some files that cannot be processed or searched

D. All of the above are problems

 

9.  Which of the following is NOT a question that CloudNine Discovery asks our clients before processing their data?

 

A. Should de-duplication performed at the case or the custodian level?

B. Should Outlook emails be extracted in MSG or PST format?

C. What time zone should we use for email extraction?

D. Should we perform OCR for image-only files that don’t have corresponding text?

 

10. According to Rob Robinson’s eDiscovery Market Size Mashup, how big will the eDiscovery Software and Services market be in 2017?

 

A. $2.78 Billion

B. $5.53 Billion

C. $7.03 Billion

D. $9.81 Billion

 

 

How did you do?  Next month, you’ll get another chance with August topics.  As always, please let us know if you have questions or comments, or if there are specific topics you’d like to see covered.

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

July Pop Quiz! – eDiscovery Trends

The pop quizzes on the Litigation 101 for eDiscovery Tech Professionals series were so well received, we thought we would try a pop quiz for the topics we’ve covered in the past month.  If you’re reading the blog each day, these questions should be easy!  If not, we’ve provided a link to the post with the answer.  We’re that nice.  Test your knowledge!  Tomorrow, we’ll post the answers for those who don’t know and didn’t look them up.

 

1.  In Cottle-Banks v. Cox Commc’ns, Inc., the plaintiff’s motion for spolation sanctions was denied because:

 

A. The defendant didn’t have an obligation to preserve the call recordings

B. The defendant didn’t have a culpable state of mind

C. The plaintiff was unable to show that the deleted recordings would have been relevant

D. None of the above

 

2.  How can you ensure that Word’s smart quotes won’t disrupt your search with garbage characters?

 

A. Disable the automatic changing of quotes to smart quotes in Word

B. Perform a “find and replace” of smart quotes to regular quotes in a text editor

C. Copy the word doc into a text editor, then convert to ASCII

D. All of the above

 

3.  Which of the following is NOT a proportionality factor in the Pennsylvania Rules of Civil Procedure, as spelled out in PTSI, Inc. v. Haley?

 

A. The total net worth of the producing party at the time the case was filed

B. The nature and scope of the litigation, including the importance and complexity of the issues and the amounts at stake

C. The relevance of electronically stored information and its importance to the court’s adjudication in the given case

D. The ease of producing electronically stored information and whether substantially similar information is available with less burden

 

4.  Which proposed Federal rule to be amended would require that courts allow discovery that is “proportional to the needs of the case”?

 

A. Rule 26(b)(1)

B. Rule 26(b)(2)(C)(iii)

C. Rule 37(e)

D. Rule 37(b)(2)(A)

 

5.  In which case were the parties disputing whether an eDiscovery vendor could work for both sides in the same case?

 

A. Lazette v. Kulmatycki

B. Gordon v. Kaleida Health

C. Harry Weiss, Inc. v. Moskowitz

D. Hart v. Dillon Cos

 

6.  How many times has the EDRM Talent Task Matrix been downloaded since it was introduced in January?

 

A. Less than 250

B. More than 250, but less than 500

C. More than 500, but less than 1,000

D. More than 1,000

 

7.  Which of the following is NOT a challenge when producing documents?

 

A. Courts and opposing counsel are increasingly demanding ‘native file productions’

B. Native files can be altered (either intentionally or not)

C. Native files don’t provide enough metadata

D. Native files cannot be redacted

 

8.  Which of the following is a problem that needs to be addressed to review electronic files?

 

A. Image only electronic files such as TIFF or image-only PDF files have no searchable text

B. Outlook Emails require processing to break them out into individual files

C. In almost every collection, there are some files that cannot be processed or searched

D. All of the above are problems

 

9.  Which of the following is NOT a question that CloudNine Discovery asks our clients before processing their data?

 

A. Should de-duplication performed at the case or the custodian level?

B. Should Outlook emails be extracted in MSG or PST format?

C. What time zone should we use for email extraction?

D. Should we perform OCR for image-only files that don’t have corresponding text?

 

10. According to Rob Robinson’s eDiscovery Market Size Mashup, how big will the eDiscovery Software and Services market be in 2017?

 

A. $2.78 Billion

B. $5.53 Billion

C. $7.03 Billion

D. $9.81 Billion

 

 

As always, please let us know if you have questions or comments, or if there are specific topics you’d like to see covered.

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

Five eDiscovery Trailblazing Judges – eDiscovery Trends

Yesterday, we discussed an article in The American Lawyer by Alan Cohen about six people who deserve special consideration as true trailblazers in eDiscovery.  Today, let’s take a look at five trailblazing judges in eDiscovery.

In Lisa Holton’s article (E-Discovery: A Front-Row Seat), also in The American Lawyer, she discusses how “judges…saw how uninformed many attorneys and their clients were about technology and how resistant they were to a series of new rules.”  She profiles five “pioneers” that “have not only set the stage in procedure and case law, but have become teachers, writers, activists, and ongoing critics of this rapidly changing industry.”  Here they are:

Shira Scheindlin, Judge, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York: Perhaps the most famous judge of the most famous case, Zubulake v. UBS Warburg, (which addressed legal holds on electronic documents) Judge Scheindlin has had a dramatic effect on shaping the industry.  She also proceeded to address the levels of culpability — negligence, gross negligence, and willfulness in the electronic discovery context in her famous Pension Committee opinion.  As Holton notes in her article, “Scheindlin’s involvement in the ongoing e-discovery pilot project dealing with complex litigation in the Southern District is an example of her continuing work to shape and improve e-discovery processes. And she’s been vocal on the issue of proportionality—the need to balance the total cost of electronic document discovery with the value of the case—from the start.”  She has also been a busy speaker on eDiscovery topics and co-published a book back in 2009 called Electronic Discovery and Digital Evidence in a Nutshell.

Lee Rosenthal, Judge, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas: After being elevated to chairman of the Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Federal Rules of Civil Procedure in 2003, Judge Rosenthal led the effort to create and adopt the 2006 amendments to the rules that addressed – for the first time – how electronically stored information (ESI) should be handled in civil litigation.  These Federal Rules have been instrumental in providing guidance to attorneys and judges on how to address issues with ESI, and the article provides some interesting “backstory” regarding that process.

Andrew Peck, U.S. Magistrate Judge, Southern District of New York: Judge Peck has been a leader in the effort to use technology to assist with the searching and review process and his February 2012 decision in Da Silva Moore v. Publicis Groupe & MSL Group is considered by many to be the first ruling approving computer-assisted review (click here for the considerable dispute that has followed) and his article Search, Forward is one of the few judicial articles advocating the use of computer-assisted review, which has become perhaps the hottest topic in eDiscovery today.

Paul Grimm, Judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland: Judge Grimm has been a key advocate for proportionality and cooperation in the eDiscovery process.  His ruling in 2008’s Mancia v. Mayflower Textile Services Co. contained a detailed examination of Rule 26(g) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which covers eDiscovery duty to disclose requirements, and other law calling for cooperation among parties in discovery.  His ruling of severe sanctions in Victor Stanley, Inc. v. Creative Pipe, Inc. was also the very first case this blog covered on our very first day.  🙂

John Facciola, U.S. Magistrate Judge, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia: Judge Facciola’s key eDiscovery opinions include: Citizens for Responsibility & Ethics in Washington v. Executive Office of the President (which forced preservation of digital media in government); United States v. O’Keefe (which set guidelines for keyword challenges); and Equity Analytics v. Lundin (which set guidelines for challenges or defenses of search methodology).  Also, In Taydon v. Greyhound Lines, Inc., he laid down the law to the parties in the case requiring cooperation on eDiscovery issues, stating “there is a new sheriff in town—not Gary Cooper, but me.”

A link to Lisa’s article is here.  So, what do you think?  How have these judicial trailblazers influenced you?   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 Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Six eDiscovery Trailblazers – eDiscovery Trends

As we discussed on Monday, the electronic discovery industry is now a multi-billion dollar industry and experiencing double-digit growth year after year.  It’s hard to believe that a couple of decades ago, this industry – for all intents and purposes – didn’t even exist.  Now it’s huge, and – as noted in Alan Cohen’s article in The American Lawyer – there are six people who deserve special consideration as true trailblazers in the industry.

Alan’s article, Present at the Creation, notes that these trailblazers “come from different backgrounds. Some are lawyers, some are technology experts, and some are a little of both. But these e-discovery leaders all share an unmistakable and seemingly unbreakable dedication to an area of the law that makes many of us scratch our heads. They have explained e-discovery, quantified it, and helped shape the rules, the case law, and even the business models. Most of the pioneers listed below have been at this for decades, but like the field itself, they’re just getting started. We still may not get as enthusiastic about e-discovery as they do, but thanks to their efforts, we’re no longer mystified by it.”  Here is a list of the eDiscovery trailblazers:

Martha Dawson, Partner, K&L Gates: In response to dealing with early 1990s electronic discovery issues in the Exxon Valdez and Microsoft antitrust litigations, Martha founded Preston Gates’s e-Discovery Analysis and Technology group (e-DAT), which was considered to be the first of its kind—a practice group dedicated exclusively to eDiscovery.  It used project-based attorneys for review that only worked on eDiscovery and who could be billed at lower rates than associates, offering clients savings of over 50 percent compared to traditional methods of document review.

George Socha, Socha Consulting & Tom Gelbmann, Gelbmann & Associates: Founders of the Electronic Discovery Reference Model (EDRM) nine years ago to standardize the definition of the eDiscovery process, the EDRM diagram has become a standard model for representing the flow of information through that process.  Since then, EDRM has delivered a number of additional models and tools to aid those in eDiscovery (including announcements this blog has covered for Model Code of Conduct, Search, Metrics, Jobs and Information Governance, to name a few).  As a member of EDRM for most of its nine years, I’ve seen a lot of accomplishments over that time.  George and Tom have also both been thought leader interviewees on this blog for the past three years.

John Tredennick, Catalyst Repository Systems: John transitioned from litigator at Denver’s Holland & Hart, to the firm’s CTO, to CEO of spin-off Catalyst Repository Systems with a vision of applying the Internet to legal technology as far back as 1996.  These days, almost everybody in the industry has experienced the benefits of cloud-based technology for eDiscovery processes such as collection and review, making it easy to access important data anywhere and share that data with other parties in the case seamlessly.  There are several vendors today offering cloud-based solutions for eDiscovery, including (shameless plug warning!) CloudNine Discovery with our OnDemand® review platform.

Jason R. Baron, U.S. National Archives and Records Adminstration: As director of litigation for the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration, Jason had to search tens of millions of White House emails as part of a discovery request by big tobacco companies in a RICO lawsuit against them.  Looking for a better approach, Jason has been a key member of the Sedona Conference and a cofounder (in 2006, with University of Maryland professor Douglas Oard), of the Legal Track at the Text Retrieval Conference (TREC).  TREC studies have been instrumental in showing the limitations of keyword search and in helping technology-assisted review win judicial approval.

Richard Braman, The Sedona Conference: As founder of The Sedona Conference, a think tank on law and policy, Braman brought together the best minds in eDiscovery to create rules for eDiscovery.  Sedona’s first working group published the groundbreaking “Sedona Principles” which are 14 guidelines for the eDiscovery process with commentary including best practices.  There are now 10 working groups on a variety of legal topics, and this blog has covered some of the guidelines, including those on Proportionality, Cooperation, Database Principles and International Principles.  The Sedona Conference continues to be a leader in best practice guidelines in the industry.

A link to Alan’s article is here.  Tomorrow, we will discuss five judges at the forefront of electronic discovery.

So, what do you think?  How have these trailblazers influenced you?   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 Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

How Big is the eDiscovery Market? Here’s all the Estimates in One Place – eDiscovery Trends

Rob Robinson’s Complex Discovery site is an excellent resource for discovery and general legal technology articles – his weekly top story digest is a terrific source for keeping tabs on the industry.  Now, Rob has created a compilation of various eDiscovery market estimates for the next several years to provide An eDiscovery Market Size Mashup for 2012 to 2017.

As Rob notes: “Taken from a combination of public market sizing estimations as shared in leading electronic discovery publications, posts and discussions over time, the following eDiscovery Market Size Mashup shares general market sizing estimates for both the software and service areas of the electronic discovery market for the years between 2012 and 2017.”

It includes a combined market view of software and services together, as well as a software-centric market view and a service-centric market view.  The highlights (based on the estimated from the compiled sources) are:

  • The eDiscovery Software and Services market is expected to grow an estimated 15.4% Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) per year from 2012 to 2017 from $5.53 billion to $9.81 billion per year.  Services comprise approximately 72% of the market and software comprises approximately 28%.
  • The eDiscovery Software market is expected to grow an estimated 16.78% annual growth per year from 2012 to 2017 from $1.49 billion to $2.78 billion per year.  Processing and Review applications currently comprise 62% of the software market (expected to drop to 55% by 2017), while Early Case Assessment applications currently comprise 38% of the market (expected to rise to 45% by 2017).
  • The eDiscovery Services market is expected to grow an estimated 14.9% annual growth per year from 2012 to 2017 from $4.04 billion to $7.03 billion per year.  The breakdown of the services market is as follows: 73% review, 19% processing and 8% collection.  Personally, I think collection will be a larger percentage that that – at least based on my experiences.

Here are the sources that Rob states were used in compiling the “mashup” (links to our blog posts when available):

For more information (including some cool, informative graphs), click here.  Thanks, Rob!

So, what do you think?  Do those growth numbers surprise you?  Do you agree with them?  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 Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Wish There Were Better Standards for Production of Native Files? Enough is ENF! – eDiscovery Trends

At the Electronic Discovery Reference Model (EDRM) annual meeting back in May, I provided updates for several of the EDRM projects, two of which (Metrics and Jobs) have already made significant announcements since the meeting.  Another project, the new Native Files project, has recently released two white papers authored by EDRM member Wade Peterson (of Bowman and Brooke LLP) proposing the creation and adoption of a new ENF (encapsulated native file) standard for the production of native files.

In Can Native File Productions be ENF (Enough)?, Peterson presents the conceptual framework for defining the new standard.  This white paper includes several sections, such as:

  • Background: Describes the historical background regarding traditional document productions as either paper, TIFF or PDF;
  • Executive Overview: Describes the problem (outdated standards defined almost two decades ago) and the purpose of the paper (to present a conceptual framework for defining a new, up-to-date standard that reflects “3-dimensional” native documents);
  • Challenges: A list of several challenges facing litigation support professionals today when producing documents, including these: “Courts and opposing counsel are increasingly demanding ‘native file productions’”, “Native files can be altered (either intentionally or not)” and “Native files cannot be redacted”;
  • Solution: The stated goal to develop a new standard for document productions, which addresses today’s concerns, has an open architecture to meet future requirements and is eventually adopted by courts as the legal standard;
  • Architecture: A detailed description of the architecture “framework for ‘encapsulating’ native files in sort of an envelope metaphor”, with a diagram to illustrate the framework;
  • Enhancements to the Standard: A discussion of possible enhancements that could be incorporated into the open-architecture standard;
  • Overcoming Obstacles: A discussion of potential obstacles as well as processes and tools needed to support this standard;
  • Conclusion: A summary call to construct a new document production standard to replace the standards “defined well over 20 years ago to produce documents which didn’t even exist 20 years ago”;
  • Author: A bio of the author, Wade Peterson.

In This is Just About ENF, Wade illustrates a sample ENF, describes some of its elements, and describes the operation of a basic utility to view ENF files.  It shows a sample XML representation of a sample ENF, describes Attributes, potential Vendor enhancements to ENF files, includes a detailed description of the Native Files element of the ENF, discusses Areas of Concern when dealing with native files and illustrates a very basic viewing tool, which he refers to as “viewENF”.

The two white papers reflect quite a bit of thought and effort to begin the process to create and adopt a new standard for addressing a growing problem – the production of a diverse collection of native files.  It will be interesting how the effort progresses to gain support for this proposed new standard.

So, what do you think?  Does this proposed standard appear to be a promising solution to the native file production issue?  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 Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Free Your Mind, the Matrix Has You – eDiscovery Trends

OK, maybe it’s not The Matrix with Neo and Morpheus, but if you perform a role in eDiscovery, the Electronic Discovery Reference Model (EDRM) Talent Task Matrix probably describes the responsibilities associated with your role in the process.

Back in February, we introduced the Talent Task Matrix as a tool collaboratively developed by EDRM’s Jobs Project Team to help hiring managers better understand the responsibilities associated with common eDiscovery roles. The Matrix maps responsibilities to the EDRM framework, so eDiscovery duties associated can be assigned to the appropriate parties.

The EDRM Talent Task Matrix Spreadsheet is available in XLSX or PDF format.  It shows the EDRM Stage and Stage Area, the Responsibility within each stage, followed by the various positions that have responsibilities within the eDiscovery life cycle.  It shows a “Yes” for each responsibility that each position participates in the responsibility.  There are 130 responsibilities listed in the Matrix, covering the entire EDRM life cycle.

Since the release of the Matrix in January 2013, it has been downloaded more than 1,000 times!  Chances are, at least some of you reading this have downloaded it.

Now, as indicated in this press release, the EDRM Jobs Team is interested in learning how the Matrix is used by people responsible for hiring and professional development in their organizations. They specifically want to know how the Matrix was used and what results were achieved.  They plan to use success stories regarding use of the Matrix to develop case studies to be posted on EDRM.net.

If you have downloaded the Matrix or know of someone who has downloaded the Matrix, EDRM would like to hear from you!  Contact Tom Gelbmann or George Socha (at mail@edrm.net) to share your experiences and results (all responses will be held in confidence).

If your organization has not yet used the Matrix, but intends to do so, you can still contact them and provide a brief summary of your plans to use the Matrix and any comments or recommendations you may have to improve on the Matrix to meet your needs.  It may not have those gun racks that appear out of nowhere, but it’s still pretty cool.

So, what do you think?  Have you used the Talent Task Matrix?  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 Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Nominate Your Favorite Law Blog – eDiscovery Trends

If you’re reading this, you obviously read law blogs.  If you have a favorite law blog (or “blawg”, get it?), now is the time to nominate it for recognition in the ABA Journal 7th Annual Blawg 100.

On their Blawg 100 Amici page, you can complete the form to identify yourself, your employer or law school, your city and email address, the URL of the blog you wish to nominate, a link to a great 2013 post from the blog and a brief (up to 500 characters) description as to why you’re a fan of the “blawg”.  You’re also asked whether you know the “blawgger” personally (and admonished to “be honest”), whether ABA Journal can use your name and comment in their coverage and, if you follow the blogger on Twitter, describe what makes him/her stand out.  You can nominate more than one “blawg”.

ABA Journal notes that they discourage submissions from:

  • Bloggers who nominate their own blogs or nominate blogs to which they have previously contributed posts.
  • Employees of law firms who nominate blogs written by their co-workers.
  • Public relations professionals in the employ of lawyers or law firms who nominate their clients’ blogs.
  • Pairs of bloggers who have clearly entered into a quid pro quo agreement to nominate each other.

Friend-of-the-blawg briefs (i.e., to fill and submit the form) by no later than Aug. 9, 2013 to include your nomination.

As a person who coordinates a daily blog, I can appreciate what it takes to publish a blog and bring interesting topics to the reader.  So, with that in mind, here are some of the excellent blogs out there that cover various eDiscovery topics:

There’s also this little blog called eDiscoveryDaily, as well.  If you would like to nominate this one, we won’t stop you!  😉

For compilations of eDiscovery news and analysis, I’d also like to recognize Law Technology News, PinHawk Law Technology Daily Digest and Complex Discovery as excellent sources for eDiscovery information.

Our hats are off to all of those who provide eDiscovery news and analysis to the industry!  Again, if you would like to nominate any of the blogs (including, of course, eDiscoveryDaily), click here.  Deadline is August 9.

So, what do you think?  Do you have a favorite eDiscovery blog or source of information?  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 Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.

Plaintiffs Take the Supreme Step in Da Silva Moore – eDiscovery Case Law

As mentioned in Law Technology News (‘Da Silva Moore’ Goes to Washington), attorneys representing lead plaintiff Monique Da Silva Moore and five other employees have filed a petition for certiorari filed with the Supreme Court arguing that New York Magistrate Judge Andrew Peck, who approved an eDiscovery protocol agreed to by the parties that included predictive coding technology, should have recused himself given his previous public statements expressing strong support of predictive coding.

Da Silva Moore and her co-plaintiffs argued in the petition that the Second Circuit Court of Appeals was too deferential to Peck when denying the plaintiff’s petition to recuse him, asking the Supreme Court to order the Second Circuit to use the less deferential “de novo” standard.  As noted in the LTN article:

“The employees also cited a circuit split in how appellate courts reviewed judicial recusals, pointing out that the Seventh Circuit reviews disqualification motions de novo. Besides resolving the circuit split, the employees asked the Supreme Court to find that the Second Circuit’s standard was incorrect under the law. Citing federal statute governing judicial recusals, the employees claimed that the law required motions for disqualification to be reviewed objectively and that a deferential standard flew in the face of statutory intent. “Rather than dispelling the appearance of a self-serving judiciary, deferential review exacerbates the appearance of impropriety that arises from judges deciding their own cases and thus undermines the purposes of [the statute],” wrote the employees in their cert petition.”

This battle over predictive coding and Judge Peck’s participation has continued for 15 months.  For a recap of the events during that time, click here.

So, what do you think?  Is this a “hail mary” for the plaintiffs and will it succeed?  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 Discovery. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine Discovery solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.