It is not often that courts write full opinions concerning discovery disputes. The simple, and perhaps obvious, reason is that most disputes are resolved through informal discussion and good-faith interaction, as contemplated by both the federal and local rules of civil procedure. Since the introduction of e-discovery rules and, more recently, the relevance and proportionality rules, we are seeing more written opinions concerning discovery.
Some federal judges have even gone so far as to develop specific procedures governing e-discovery. An example from the online procedures of some of the district judges in the Eastern District requires the parties to conduct an e-discovery conference, designate an e-discovery liaison and a retention coordinator, develop a search methodology and identify privileged information. The idea behind such rules is to eliminate disputes that may arise during discovery.
