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June 5, 2006
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 David Snow, Law.com's Legal Technology editor, reports from LegalTech West Coast. With his daily e-mail, registered participants won't miss any of the show's highlights. Watch for it in your e-mail inbox!
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LegalTech West Coast Opens in Los Angeles
ALM Media's LegalTech West Coast 2006 opened Monday at the Westin Bonaventure in downtown Los Angeles. The two-day event's 34 educational sessions on 10 educational tracks complement a bustling show floor featuring 140 exhibitors.
The show's smaller than the New York version -- the king of all legal technology shows -- but it carries with it a lot of the same excitement. Notes from the opening day follow.
The Opening Keynote
The first order of business for many people was the opening keynote presentation by Kevin Harrang, a Microsoft Corp. deputy general counsel for legal and corporate affairs. His talk, entitled "Legal Technology: How IT is affecting the legal service needs of corporate clients, and what this means for law firms and other industry providers," focused on the fast-evolving technology used in the legal industry, as well as Microsoft's not-terribly specific hopes for its development.
First things first: Harrang got a big laugh when he projected an image of a seemingly familiar Microsoft Office pulldown menu. A ripple of laughter rolled through the audience of about 200 people when they saw the commands, which included Undo Stupid Changes, Take Back Flippant Comment and the one Harrang offers as evidence that the slide must've been made by a lawyer: Find Better Client.
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Harrang pointed to success stories in current legal technology trends. His examples included Cisco Systems' use of outside counsel and fixed-fee billing in litigation, and the adept use of specialized software and service providers in e-discovery by companies such as Altria and GM.
Regarding challenges ahead, Harrang sees much room for improvement in electronic billing in a market where 70 percent of law firms still use paper. He suggested a victory for the industry will come when it has better matter-management methods integrated with existing technology, rather than new products that must be mastered before they can be used. He also cited records and e-mail management as huge areas of concern, as 43 percent of U.S. companies still have no retention plan and 53 percent have no system in place for storage. He cited Microsoft's e-mail pilot program and said he expects online systems should start to come to the fore.
"We're really just starting out this process," Harrang said at the end of the presentation. "We believe all the exciting stuff is in front of us."
After the keynote, Harrang spoke to me briefly about Microsoft's entrance to the legal technology market, saying it's usually a gradual process when the software giant takes an interest in a new market.
"At the outset, some [software] vendors say, 'Oh my God, they're going to make one of our things.'" But before long, he added, "Some customers start saying, 'Please, would you make some of these things.'"
In Katrina's Wake: Case Studies in Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Planning
 In February 2006, Monica Bay and Russ Curtis, Law Technology News magazine's editor-in-chief and photo editor, respectively, traveled to New Orleans to document the legal technology community's recovery from Hurricane Katrina in a series of articles for ALM publications.
Today, Bay and her four-person panel told stories of legal professionals' personal and professional triumphs in the face of a disaster that left 80 percent of New Orleans flooded.
Even now, 60 percent of the city is uninhabitable, said panelist Tom O'Connor, an LTN magazine board member who lives part of the year in New Orleans. "You can plan for a disaster, but you can't plan for a catastrophe," he said. "This was a catastrophe."
A sense of drama pervaded the room as panelists relayed their experiences. Even as they worried about their own families and staff missing in action, some had to break into their own law offices to retrieve servers and other critical equipment before they could even begin rebuilding at alternate sites.
An important bottom line of the session was that if you take care of the people, business continuity will follow.
Look for Monica Bay's session recap in this space on Wednesday.
The Rules Cometh
One of the big topics in legal tech is the changing Rules of Civil Procedure where e-discovery is concerned. The U.S. Supreme Court has signed off on them, and, if no further changes occur, they go into effect on December 1, 2006. Next question: How does one profit from this situation?
Portland, Ore.-based e-discovery services provider Fios is making a go of it. The company announced a new module today for its Litigation Readiness Assessment service. It's intended to help corporate legal and IT departments understand the gaps between what they're doing with EDD now and what they'll be compelled to do, and to justify in court, soon.
"On the pre-litigation side of it, [the service] is designed to better prepare for shorter timeframes, and to focus assessment around the amendments," said Brad Harris, Fios' director of product management.
Read more here.
Be a Savvy E-Discovery Shopper
One of Monday's most crowded sessions was Electronic Discovery Services and Pricing: Learn How to Be a Smart Shopper, part of the advanced EDD track.
Evidence collection, processing, review, consultation, project management -- a legal professional's search for the best e-discovery options can be time-consuming, frustrating and expensive. How much should you pay this vendor or that vendor to fulfill a task; should you even have separate vendors for those tasks? The panelists didn't necessarily agree on the answers. A big reason why: Every case, law firm and e-discovery vendor is different. If you're going to avoid hidden costs and risks, you've got to plan with the variables you have.
"Good pricing starts with a good plan," said panelist Linda Adele, manager of practice support for O'Melveny & Myers, who heavily favors outsourcing to trusted sources for complex tasks. "You've got to know what you want to accomplish."
Conference Coverage
* Monday notes
* Tuesday notes
* Looking back on LegalTech West Coast 2006
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Stay informed about important legal technology developments after Legal Tech ends.
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