Law.com Subscribers SAVE 30%
Call 855-808-4530 or email [email protected] to receive your discount on a new subscription.
Practice Tip: 'It's NOT Electronic Paper'
Is data really different? Does the information we routinely manipulate, transmit and delete everyday pose fundamentally new issues with respect to evidence and discovery in litigation than the paper of the past centuries? As the courts and clients struggle with the growing complexities of electronic information, the federal judiciary has begun exploring proposals aimed at addressing the challenges of electronic discovery, including safe harbor provisions, clawback options and peculiarities of legacy data. While several of the current federal proposals are still open for comment, it is worth taking a moment to consider the fundamental properties of electronic data and how conventional thoughts on evidence do or do not apply. As comforting as it would be to think of electronic evidence as just digital paper, the reality is that there are some inherent properties of electronic evidence that make it fundamentally different from conventional evidence. Specifically, electronic evidence differs in quantity, duration, content and context from conventional evidence in ways that challenge many fundamental assumptions of discovery.
The quantitative difference of electronic information is obvious when compared to conventional evidence, but what many neglect to consider is that the quantity of electronic information is quickly approaching the limit of what humans can process in a realistic period of time. It is now not uncommon for a case to involve a large fraction of, if not more than, a terabyte of data. To put this in perspective, if you were to print out a terabyte of data from a typical office it would easily produce a stack of paper over 30,000 feet high. That is a scope of review that is formidable for any firm. Now imagine that same review 2 or 3 years hence as the amount of data continues to grow and the 3 to 5 terabyte cases become more common. How exactly can you organize a comprehensive review of that amount of data? How long will a meaningful review take? Will the concept of 'complete review of the evidence' be replaced by statistical methods as a means of practically dealing with this challenge, or will court timelines extend into decades. It's not just that there is more information than before; it's that there is so much more that the task reaches the bounds of practical review. This has as yet undiscovered implications for things as fundamental as the rules of evidence.
Bankruptcy Sales: Finding a Diamond In the Rough
There is no efficient market for the sale of bankruptcy assets. Inefficient markets yield a transactional drag, potentially dampening the ability of debtors and trustees to maximize value for creditors. This article identifies ways in which investors may more easily discover bankruptcy asset sales.
Judge Rules Shaquille O'Neal Will Face Securities Lawsuit for Promotion, Sale of NFTs
A federal district court in Miami, FL, has ruled that former National Basketball Association star Shaquille O'Neal will have to face a lawsuit over his promotion of unregistered securities in the form of cryptocurrency tokens and that he was a "seller" of these unregistered securities.
Why So Many Great Lawyers Stink at Business Development and What Law Firms Are Doing About It
Why is it that those who are best skilled at advocating for others are ill-equipped at advocating for their own skills and what to do about it?
Blockchain Domains: New Developments for Brand Owners
Blockchain domain names offer decentralized alternatives to traditional DNS-based domain names, promising enhanced security, privacy and censorship resistance. However, these benefits come with significant challenges, particularly for brand owners seeking to protect their trademarks in these new digital spaces.
'Insurable Interest' and the Scope of First-Party Coverage
This article reviews the fundamental underpinnings of the concept of insurable interest, and certain recent cases that have grappled with the scope of insurable interest and have articulated a more meaningful application of the concept to claims under first-party property policies.