eDiscovery Resources

Guide to eDiscovery Resources on the Web

No lawyer today can afford to ignore e-discovery. No matter the case, no matter the court, digital data is likely to be implicated. Below is a guide to some of the more useful Web sites blogs and vendor sites for learning about and keeping current with eDiscovery.

Getting Started

DiscoveryResources provides news, information and resources about e-discovery. Through both original content and outside links, the site provides timely news stories, substantive articles, tutorials, seminars, podcasts, legal forms and other tools.

Legal Technology Resource Center. The site devotes a section to courtroom technology and, within that, a guide to e-discovery resources.

eLawExchange. A central feature of this free site is a database of e-discovery case law and rules from all 50 states. A second database contains information on individuals and companies that provide e-discovery services and consulting. Other features of the site include articles on e-discovery and links to related resources.

California Civil Discovery Law. There is an extensive collection of resources covering state and federal e-discovery, as well as related issues such as e-discovery ethics.

Complex Discovery, here Rob Robinson provides a source for “information, tools and tactics relevant to the growing discovery market.” The site is organized around key e-discovery stages, such as collection, processing, review and production, and includes a number of useful resources.
Electronic Evidence Information Center  modest collection of links to resources and conferences relating to e-discovery and computer forensics.
Women in eDiscovery focuses on women in law and business with an interest in legal technology.

Research and Practices

The Sedona Conference, a non-profit organization devoted to innovation in antitrust law, complex litigation and intellectual property law. It has devoted substantial work to the establishment of best practices in e-discovery.

National Center for State Courts is immersed in issues surrounding e-discovery in state courts and the site compiles research and resources on e-discovery and houses a variety of articles on the topic.

Electronic Discovery Institute describes itself as a public-interest organization conducting research into the efficacy of various methods of e-discovery. According to the site, the institute’s inaugural study is underway, testing the reliability of search and retrieval technology. Once completed, the study will be published on the site.

Socha Consulting produces an annual Socha-Gelbmann Electronic Discovery Survey. Think of it as the Consumer Reports of e-discovery vendors. The survey ranks the top e-discovery companies and provides information on many others.

Law Technology News. Site provides relevant industry articles and updates in case law for a wide array of technological aspects of the lww including eDiscovery.

The Electronic Discovery Reference Model.  devoted to development and deployment of a model set of standards and guidelines governing e-discovery.

EDDix is a company devoted to research, analysis and reporting on e-discovery. The “ix” in its name stands for “information exchange.”

e-Disclosure Information Project  is run by Chris Dale, a former commercial litigation partner turned e-Disclosure consultant. The Project aims to bring together lawyers, suppliers, courts and corporations with an interest in electronic disclosure, and to disseminate information about the court rules, the problems and the software and services available to handle them.

Reading Up on E-Discovery

A number of sites house original news stories, practice pieces, white papers, seminar presentations and other materials devoted to e-discovery.

Electronic Data Discovery.  Within Law.com’s Legal Technology Center, tt features news articles and expert commentary written for the site and drawn from legal newspapers and magazines. An “E-Discovery Roadmap” lets you navigate your way through steps in the e-discovery process and learn about their requirements and best practices.

LLRX has long been a superior site for articles and resources on law technology and practice. The site features articles and updates covering e-discovery.

Federal Judicial Center has a “materials on electronic discovery” link from its front page. The collection focuses on civil litigation and includes FJC workshop and seminar materials, research and publications, along with links to selected external materials. A link points to a separate page of materials focused on search and seizure of electronic data in criminal cases.

Electronic Discovery Center provides substantive articles and white papers on e-discovery along with vendor press releases. An “E-Discovery Wizard” provides checklists and links to articles regarding specific provisions of the federal rules.

Law Journal Newsletters, a division of ALM, publishes the newsletter E-Discovery Law & Strategy, which can be reached through this site. Subscribers can view the full text of articles as well as download the entire newsletter in PDF. Non-subscribers can view article summaries and purchase individual articles.

Litigation Support Vendors Association. This site is home to multiple, free discussion forums covering such topics as e-discovery, computer forensics and best practices. All are moderated by industry experts and representatives of legal-technology companies. Jobs within the litigation support industry are also posted here.

E-Discovery Blogs

New blogs devoted to e-discovery pop up incredibly frequently; below are someof the better resources. Some focus on e-discovery law and practice and others on the e-discovery industry, but all are potentially useful for keeping current with the field.

• Dennis Kennedy – Lawyer and consultant, Kennedy writes about a range of legal-technology topics and frequently covers e-discovery.
• EDD Blog Online -Promises an “insider’s look” at e-discovery. Many of the posts are excerpts of articles from other sources.
• EDD Update – Joint project of Law Technology News and Law.com Legal Technology, this blog is a venue for posting breaking news, key verdicts and judicial rulings, articles, press releases and more.
• E-Discovery and Computer Forensic Blog – The blog of a Los Angeles e-discovery company, many posts are full-text articles from other sources.
• E-Discovery Team – Ralph C. Losey,writes this top-notch blog. His posts are frequent and substantive, covering both e-discovery law and practice.
• E-discovery 2.0 – Subtitled “Thoughts about the evolution of e-discovery,” this blog is written by Aaref Hilaly, CEO of e-discovery company Clearwell Systems.
• Electronic Discovery and Evidence – This blog to report updates in the law of e-discovery, although his postings are infrequent.
• Electronic Discovery Blog –  About both law and technology.
• Electronic Discovery Law – Technology lawyers at the firm K & L Gates write this blog that includes summaries of court decisions and updates on related legal issues.
• In re Discovery – The blog of Socha Consulting, the firm discussed in part one of this column, that publishes the annual Socha-Gelbmann Electronic Discovery Survey.
• LawTech Guru Blog – Blogs about new developments in e-discovery.
• Litigation Support Industry News – This blog tracks news about the companies that provide litigation support and e-discovery services.
• Ride the Lightning – Blog’s goal is to help readers better understand electronic evidence.
• Sound Evidence – One of the best known e-discovery blogs, it is written by Mary Mack, technology counsel to e-discovery company Fios and co-author of the book A Process of Illumination: The Practical Guide to Electronic Discovery.
• Strategic Legal Technology – Lawyer and legal technology consultant Ron Friedmann writes about e-discovery, litigation support, KM and other technology topics.

Vendor Sites

A number of companies that market e-discovery services also provide useful resources on their Web sites. In part one of this article, I described DiscoveryResources an e-discovery portal sponsored by the company Fios.

Other companies whose sites include useful resources for lawyers include:

• Applied Discovery -Boasts a surprisingly diverse selection of case summaries, model forms, articles and white papers. Worth noting is the library’s collection of court rules, covering state as well as federal rules and including links to related ethics rulings.
• Attenex – Provides a collection of “on-demand webcasts” – previously recorded Web seminars on topics such as best practices, controlling costs and native file review also contains a library of white papers on a range of practical e-discovery topics, many written by practitioners.
• Catalyst – The Articles tab of the site’s “In the News” page includes articles written by experts on e-discovery and document management.
• CT Summation – A small collection of white papers focuses on topics relating to e-discovery and use of electronic evidence.
• Fios– sponsors DiscoveryResources an e-discovery portal sponsored by the company
• Merrill Corporation – Within the Legal Solutions section of Merrill’s site is a Knowledge Center with a selection of articles to download. Topics include choosing an e-discovery vendor and managing electronic evidence.
• OnSite3 – Within the Resources section of this company’s Web site are two useful tools. One, the eDiscovery Estimator, helps you estimate the size of an e-discovery project. The other, the XML Load File Converter, is software you can download for free and use for batch conversions of data to XML format. Other resources available at this site include podcasts and white papers on e-discovery topics.
• Ontrack Data Recovery – Discovery of electronic data sometimes requires recovery of lost electronic data, thanks to hard-drive damage or system failure. Ontrack’s site offers more than three dozen substantive articles and white papers on data recovery.
• Sensei Enterprises –  Provide a library on their Web site of their broad-ranging articles dating back to 2002.
• Stratify – Skip the “eDiscovery Resources” section of this site, where the focus is on pitching Stratify’s products, and go instead to its selections of white papers and published articles. The latter, in particular, has several good pieces on e-discovery practice and technology.