Weekly Letter to Our EDRM Global Community

Image: Holley Robinson, EDRM with AI.

Dearest EDRM Community,

Word of the week: Dynamic.

In legal tech this week, investment surged as our community and market embraced AI amid a quick and muscular assumption of power by the new US Administration.

Let’s each reach out and support the newly laid-off community members due to federal and anti-DEI layoffs. At EDRM, all are welcome.
Mary, Kaylee, and Holley, EDRM.

Let’s remain united in our support for each other. For support or to assist a colleague, contact us at info@edrm.net and join our weekly Community Support Call, now in its fifth year.

On the EDRM Blog:

Upcoming Webinars on the EDRM Global Webinar Channel:

20 February 2025: 1PM Eastern: The Litigator’s Toolkit: Streamlining Case Preparation with AI and Modern Technology
25 February 2025: 1PM Eastern: Important eDiscovery Case Law Decisions for February 2025
26 February 2025: 1PM Eastern: 2025 E-Discovery Optimization: Faster Insights with Modern Data Strategies

Updates from Around the Globe:

Global Legal Tech Developments: Negotiations have started between Russia and the US in Saudi Arabia about and without Ukraine as Europe regroups. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy met with the leader of the United Arab Emirates on Monday toward a peace agreement. The cease-fire in the Middle East is strained and holding as the longer-term plan for Gaza unfolds. Pope Francis is in the hospital for complex respiratory treatment. Australia has banned foreigners from buying some homes to ease the housing crisis. Unemployment spiked in DC during the many federal job losses.
International eDiscovery Trends: Harvey and Eudia harvested over $400m in bringing AI to legal. A teen, arrested for swatting for hire, masterminded hundreds of incidents. A company is posting job openings for lawyers and then trying to sell them training programs. Just Security released its Artificial Intelligence Archive. There is a new pack of open-source templates for security teams, and this one is on incident response. ComplexDiscovery wrote about AI and its thirst for water and power, as well as the tools that DOGE is using to access federal systems. Our phones can bring some needed calm.
World Events Impacting Legal Tech: Experts Paul Easton and John Wilson joined moderator Mary Bennett and EDRM’s Mary Mack on the quarterly workshop sponsored by trusted partner HaystackID to discuss Managing Data Overload and Complexity in Catastrophic Events. The transcript is here, and the link to the webinar is here. Brett Burney and Doug Austin continued the conversation about how to treat hyperlinked attachments in our Trusted Partner Nextpoint’s webinar. Mike Berman wrote about drafting legal hold notices and competing motions to compel in employment litigation (thank you, Doug Austin, for including this in your Kitchen Sink). Trusted Partner Merlin Search Technologies’ John Tredennick and Dr. William Webber used their platform to construct closing arguments in the BP litigation.

Catch our latest syndicated EDRM Global Podcast Network episodes on iTunes, Spotify, Google Play, and more.

**Recent Illumination Zone Podcasts:**

Recent guests include Ryan Costello, Jess Moore, Jenna Rooney, Anthony Diaz, Kris Taylor, Stephanie Wienke, and Doug Kaminski.

**Recent Echoes of AI Podcasts:**

EDRM Announcements:

The AI Ethics and Bias project released its first quarter update to the Judicial Standing Orders Repository.
Update to EDRM’s Code of Conduct: EDRM has updated its Code of Conduct for respect and civility at in-person, virtual, social, and project events.
Generative AI Policy Update: Check out our updated Generative AI and Large Language Model policy, focusing on disclosure and fact-checking. Read the Policy Here.

Weekly Community Support Call: Join us every Tuesday at 6PM Eastern on Zoom for support and camaraderie. Email info@edrm.net for an invitation to our 262nd call. For mental health care, consider these professional resources.

All are welcome,

Mary, Kaylee, and Holley

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P.S. This update was assisted by GAI and LLM Technologies as per EDRM GAI and LLM Policy.

Authors

Mary Mack

Mary Mack is the CEO and Chief Legal Technologist for EDRM. Mary was the co-editor of the Thomson Reuters West Treatise, eDiscovery for Corporate Counsel for 10 years and the co-author of A Process of Illumination: the Practical Guide to Electronic Discovery. She holds the CISSP among her certifications.
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Kaylee Walstad

Kaylee Walstad, chief strategy officer of EDRM, leads the global project based organization and is the former VP of client engagement at a certification organization. Kaylee is known for her role in building communities, uniting people and companies across the globe, and brand amplification for partners through social media and events. A frequent public speaker on a variety of topics, from personal development to the nuances of e-discovery. Kaylee has a broad background in e-discovery and skills that uniquely position her to provide insight into the challenges faced by the end-users of e-discovery services and technology and the organizations serving them. She has extensive expertise in developing cross organizational discovery strategies for large litigation and investigations.
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Holley Robinson

Holley Robinson is the Marketing Operations Manager for EDRM and ComplexDiscovery OÜ. She supports social media strategy, podcast and webinar production, and content management for EDRM while also overseeing updates to ComplexDiscovery’s industry-recognized eDisclosure Buyers Guide and assisting with their social media and content efforts. A recent graduate of Texas Tech University with a background in marketing, Holley began her journey in eDiscovery as an intern with EDRM and now contributes to amplifying valuable resources for the eDiscovery community.
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