Back in the day when computers like these (my first computer!) had data storage in the megabyte range, no-one thought of storing anything other than, well, numbers and text on them. Perhaps some basic graphics. Well, okay, you could do a fair bit with 80MB of space.
Nowadays, of course, you can fit 1TB of data into something that's a quarter the size (more or less) and we store our entire lives on there - photos, scanned documents, movies, music, finances, games, spreadsheets, slideshows, emails, contact lists . . . . Oh, and work stuff too. This exponential growth in data storage capabilities is known as Moore's law.
But in the future, we may see that external 1TB hard drive shrink down to the size of a quarter. Thanks to some pretty nifty techniques from nanotechnology, we can look forward to our entire lives being stored on something the size of your average USB thumb drive. Or even smaller. After all, this technology claims that it will provide 1TB of storage on the surface area of a quarter.
Pretty impressive, huh?
Just imagine the eDiscovery of the future. Instead of a litigation with a couple of terabytes being considered on the large side, we'll be looking at petabytes of data. One hopes that search technologies are vastly improved for these oversized haystacks . . .
Although I do have to wonder just how much data can be created by just one person, or just one company.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Friday, February 13, 2009
Hope for Obsolete File Types
While reading the news on BBC's website about the Continental plane crash, which happened only a few miles from where I live, I found this article tucked away in the Technology section.
A number of researchers across Europe are involved in a project called Keeping Emulation Environments Portable (appropriately "KEEP" - there must be people out there that have a full-time career creating project names that result in catchy acronyms). The goal of the project is to create emulators that can read whatever obsolete file format you might have floating around.
It's a bigger problem than you might imagine: the number of unreadable documents in archives is beginning to mount up. Britain's National Archive estimates that it holds enough information to fill about 580,000 encyclopedias in formats that are no longer widely available; and research by the British Library estimates that the delay caused by accessing and preserving old digital files costs European businesses about £2.7bn a year.
It will be interesting to watch this project as it develops. Imagine being able to take your Wang word processor files and read them in true native format thanks to an emulator (after carefully preserving them and making evidentiary sound working copies, of course).
A number of researchers across Europe are involved in a project called Keeping Emulation Environments Portable (appropriately "KEEP" - there must be people out there that have a full-time career creating project names that result in catchy acronyms). The goal of the project is to create emulators that can read whatever obsolete file format you might have floating around.
It's a bigger problem than you might imagine: the number of unreadable documents in archives is beginning to mount up. Britain's National Archive estimates that it holds enough information to fill about 580,000 encyclopedias in formats that are no longer widely available; and research by the British Library estimates that the delay caused by accessing and preserving old digital files costs European businesses about £2.7bn a year.
It will be interesting to watch this project as it develops. Imagine being able to take your Wang word processor files and read them in true native format thanks to an emulator (after carefully preserving them and making evidentiary sound working copies, of course).
Monday, February 2, 2009
Could this finally mean the widespread adoption of technology at law firms?
Well, probably not. But this article at the NYTimes suggests that the demise of the billable hour is, if not imminent, at least more likely than it has been for a while.
I've long maintained that the billable hour promotes inefficiency and is not conducive to the long-term interests of law firms. It's nice to see that clients are actually demanding fee structures that promote efficiency (the flat fee) and reward performance (such as a flat fee plus a bonus for achieving a quick settlement).
Perhaps now, law firms will take the adoption of serious technology a little more to heart.
There is a "but" however. As I'm fond of telling my clients, it's not just the technology, it's also the workflow you build around it, and the people using it. (As our logo says - it's People Process Technology - in roughly that order.)
All the best whiz-bang technology in the world will not make you more efficient if you don't train your people on how to use it properly and haven't thought through the process that the technology is supposed to enhance.
So before any lawyers reading this rush off to buy the latest-and-greatest piece of technology, plan how it's going to fit into what your firm actually does, who will use it, and how much you're willing to spend on training.
Otherwise you'll end up with just more really cool-looking shelfware . . .
I've long maintained that the billable hour promotes inefficiency and is not conducive to the long-term interests of law firms. It's nice to see that clients are actually demanding fee structures that promote efficiency (the flat fee) and reward performance (such as a flat fee plus a bonus for achieving a quick settlement).
Perhaps now, law firms will take the adoption of serious technology a little more to heart.
There is a "but" however. As I'm fond of telling my clients, it's not just the technology, it's also the workflow you build around it, and the people using it. (As our logo says - it's People Process Technology - in roughly that order.)
All the best whiz-bang technology in the world will not make you more efficient if you don't train your people on how to use it properly and haven't thought through the process that the technology is supposed to enhance.
So before any lawyers reading this rush off to buy the latest-and-greatest piece of technology, plan how it's going to fit into what your firm actually does, who will use it, and how much you're willing to spend on training.
Otherwise you'll end up with just more really cool-looking shelfware . . .
Friday, January 30, 2009
A fascinating snippet from Slate today that nicely demonstrates that if your company has yet to put together a decent records management policy, you're not alone.
Apparently US federal electronic archiving policies are next to non-existent. Oh yes, everyone in the various branches of federal government understands the paper archiving policies, but electronic records are left out in the cold. (Speaking of which, will winter ever end? I'd like to get back to biking).
A 2005 report by the National Archives and Records Administration stated that "electronic records are generally not disposed of in accordance" with federal regulations. In particular, many e-mails are "being destroyed prematurely". For followers of eDiscovery issues, the reasons for premature destruction and failure to follow supposed records policies will be familiar:
1. Use of personal computers to write emails, and subsequent failure to turn in those files.
2. Electronic records are less tangible than paper records and they are often not considered to be records needing to be filed and retired properly.
3. The job of records custodian is left unfilled, and when filled the holders of the position are not properly trained in their record retention obligations.
4. The National Archives' technology branch (which is the entity responsible for retaining appropriate records) is so antiquated that it cannot process common file types such as Microsoft Word documents and PowerPoint slides.
This last reason for failure to archive records properly may not seem to be immediately relevant to most companies. However, it's not unusual for companies to have a mirror-image of this problem: an inability to read records because they are stored in a format that is simply too antiquated to be of any use. (Anyone have any 51/2 inch diskettes left? What about the hardware to read them?)
Although this article is slanted towards the need for federal agencies to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests, but could equally apply to companies needing to deal with eDiscovery demands.
Apparently US federal electronic archiving policies are next to non-existent. Oh yes, everyone in the various branches of federal government understands the paper archiving policies, but electronic records are left out in the cold. (Speaking of which, will winter ever end? I'd like to get back to biking).
A 2005 report by the National Archives and Records Administration stated that "electronic records are generally not disposed of in accordance" with federal regulations. In particular, many e-mails are "being destroyed prematurely". For followers of eDiscovery issues, the reasons for premature destruction and failure to follow supposed records policies will be familiar:
1. Use of personal computers to write emails, and subsequent failure to turn in those files.
2. Electronic records are less tangible than paper records and they are often not considered to be records needing to be filed and retired properly.
3. The job of records custodian is left unfilled, and when filled the holders of the position are not properly trained in their record retention obligations.
4. The National Archives' technology branch (which is the entity responsible for retaining appropriate records) is so antiquated that it cannot process common file types such as Microsoft Word documents and PowerPoint slides.
This last reason for failure to archive records properly may not seem to be immediately relevant to most companies. However, it's not unusual for companies to have a mirror-image of this problem: an inability to read records because they are stored in a format that is simply too antiquated to be of any use. (Anyone have any 51/2 inch diskettes left? What about the hardware to read them?)
Although this article is slanted towards the need for federal agencies to respond to Freedom of Information Act requests, but could equally apply to companies needing to deal with eDiscovery demands.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Service of Process - courtesy of Facebook
My apologies for anyone that's actually been checking in to my blog since my last post in (ahem) October. I have been tied up with a trip to England and various business activities. And now that it's no longer biking season (at least not for me), that ruled out fully half my blog topics.
But I did read a fascinating article on the BBC this morning that I thought would be of interest to some of you.
The Australian Capital Territory Supreme Court in Canberra, Australia, was persuaded by two lawyers from Meyer Vandenberg that a default judgment could be served to the defendants via their Facebook pages.
Having tried to contact the defendants in person at their last known address, by mail, and all the other usual methods, the two lawyers, Mark McCormack and Jason Oliver, did an internet search on the defendants' known email addresses, and up popped one of their Facebook accounts.
They matched the biographical information they had on the defendants with their Facebook accounts and the court deemed this sufficient to demonstrate that these were, in fact, the same people as the defendants.
Australian courts in the past have allowed people to be served via email or even text message.
I wonder when we'll see our first service-by-internet case in Canada?
But I did read a fascinating article on the BBC this morning that I thought would be of interest to some of you.
The Australian Capital Territory Supreme Court in Canberra, Australia, was persuaded by two lawyers from Meyer Vandenberg that a default judgment could be served to the defendants via their Facebook pages.
Having tried to contact the defendants in person at their last known address, by mail, and all the other usual methods, the two lawyers, Mark McCormack and Jason Oliver, did an internet search on the defendants' known email addresses, and up popped one of their Facebook accounts.
They matched the biographical information they had on the defendants with their Facebook accounts and the court deemed this sufficient to demonstrate that these were, in fact, the same people as the defendants.
Australian courts in the past have allowed people to be served via email or even text message.
I wonder when we'll see our first service-by-internet case in Canada?
Wednesday, October 22, 2008
A Lotus Notes resource
Lotus Notes is often misunderstood, even by those who should know better. Vendors will happily convert NSF's to PST's without once bothering to check if the NSF's are even mail files, let alone examining them for custom email fields.
Truth is, Lotus Notes is a database which is used for email, calendars, tasks and all that good stuff just like Microsoft Outlook. But it is also designed to serve as the basis for many other database-oriented applications.
Need a CRM system? Notes can do that. Need a web-based customer service centre? Yep, Notes can do that too. Or rather, Lotus Notes application developers can do that. It's not as if Notes does it all by itself . . .
Anyway, I wanted to let you all know that Intechgration now has a new sister website - www.eddnotes.com, created and carefully monitored by Intechgration's very own Steve Treible who has over a decade of experience in Lotus Notes and is both a certified Lotus Notes Administrator and Lotus Notes Developer.
So if you have any questions about your Notes-based eDiscovery, drop us a line using the form on www.eddnotes.com, and watch the site for updates!
Truth is, Lotus Notes is a database which is used for email, calendars, tasks and all that good stuff just like Microsoft Outlook. But it is also designed to serve as the basis for many other database-oriented applications.
Need a CRM system? Notes can do that. Need a web-based customer service centre? Yep, Notes can do that too. Or rather, Lotus Notes application developers can do that. It's not as if Notes does it all by itself . . .
Anyway, I wanted to let you all know that Intechgration now has a new sister website - www.eddnotes.com, created and carefully monitored by Intechgration's very own Steve Treible who has over a decade of experience in Lotus Notes and is both a certified Lotus Notes Administrator and Lotus Notes Developer.
So if you have any questions about your Notes-based eDiscovery, drop us a line using the form on www.eddnotes.com, and watch the site for updates!
Technology Hares and Legal Tortoises
I was at an after-work seminar this evening sponsored by Commonwealth Legal that featured the renowned Michael Arkfeld who is well-known in the litigation support community for being one of the (too few) lawyers who truly understand eDiscovery.
His presentation covered a number of points, mainly with a US focus, but one thing he touched on really jumped out at me. He was talking about the US Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, in particular Rule 26(b)(2)(B) which states "(a) party need not provide discovery of electronically stored information from sources that the party identifies as not reasonably accessible because of undue burden or cost".
Now, many lawyers, when this rule first came out, took this to mean that there was no reason to worry about backup tapes any more. After all, we all know that backup tapes cost a small fortune to restore, index, get data off, and generally use for discovery purposes. But that was back in 2006. Since then, Index Engines has come out with technology that indexes tapes without having to go through all the pain and trouble of restoring them. (See here for an interesting blog post on their product).
In other words, Index Engine's technology has made reliance on some case law which specifies backup tapes as being "not reasonably accessible" a dangerous thing to do.
So this raises an obvious question. How can lawyers (who are rarely comfortable with technology anyway) hope to keep up with the fast pace of technology? For every problem that eDiscovery throws at the IT world (and legal professionals) someone will come up with some kind of solution to make it faster, cheaper and easier.
Michael Arkfeld's suggestion was to have some kind of eDiscovery technology clearing-house, which is not a bad idea, although perhaps difficult to implement. My suggestion, until Mr. Arkfeld gets his Technology Clearinghouse up and running, is to at least try to read industry publications (not just law firm technology publications - Information Week is also a surprisingly good source of eDiscovery trends from an IT perspective) and go to a trade show once in a while. LegalTech NY is probably the best for checking out who is doing what in the eDiscovery world.
His presentation covered a number of points, mainly with a US focus, but one thing he touched on really jumped out at me. He was talking about the US Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, in particular Rule 26(b)(2)(B) which states "(a) party need not provide discovery of electronically stored information from sources that the party identifies as not reasonably accessible because of undue burden or cost".
Now, many lawyers, when this rule first came out, took this to mean that there was no reason to worry about backup tapes any more. After all, we all know that backup tapes cost a small fortune to restore, index, get data off, and generally use for discovery purposes. But that was back in 2006. Since then, Index Engines has come out with technology that indexes tapes without having to go through all the pain and trouble of restoring them. (See here for an interesting blog post on their product).
In other words, Index Engine's technology has made reliance on some case law which specifies backup tapes as being "not reasonably accessible" a dangerous thing to do.
So this raises an obvious question. How can lawyers (who are rarely comfortable with technology anyway) hope to keep up with the fast pace of technology? For every problem that eDiscovery throws at the IT world (and legal professionals) someone will come up with some kind of solution to make it faster, cheaper and easier.
Michael Arkfeld's suggestion was to have some kind of eDiscovery technology clearing-house, which is not a bad idea, although perhaps difficult to implement. My suggestion, until Mr. Arkfeld gets his Technology Clearinghouse up and running, is to at least try to read industry publications (not just law firm technology publications - Information Week is also a surprisingly good source of eDiscovery trends from an IT perspective) and go to a trade show once in a while. LegalTech NY is probably the best for checking out who is doing what in the eDiscovery world.
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