The respected e-discovery commentator Tom O’Connor has published his initial report on LegalTech on his blog, with the title The Big Takeaway from LegalTech New York. His patch in the US e-discovery scene roughly parallels mine in the UK. We did a panel together at LegalTech (see How safe is safe harbor?) and we are both involved with e-Disclosure Information Project sponsor Anacomp/CaseLogistix.

Tom’s main theme is the growing realisation of the importance of the clients’ data at the left hand (information management) end of the EDRM diagram, and the links between content management and electronic discovery. His comment is actually about the lack of such realisation by lawyers, despite the fact that clients and suppliers are moving there fast – Autonomy’s pending acquisition of Interwoven is clearly founded in part on this realisation.

Tom rightly ties this assessment of the lawyers’ slowness to grasp the point to Judge Facciola’s speech, which remarked on the stubborn refusal of lawyers to accept that technology must be understood by those who purport to conduct litigation. I will shortly put up my own report of Judge Facciola’s speech.

The key, in the US and in the UK, is education. Clients, courts and justice itself are badly served for as long as lawyers refuse to accept that handling electronic documents requires a modicum of knowledge about the subject.

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