A Seven-Course Banquet of Judges, Frameworks and Friends

[EDRM Editor’s Note: EDRM has wonderful Trusted Partners and is proud to amplify and support their events and activities.. EDRM was a proud Educational Sponsor of RelFest 2026 held in Chicago, September 28-October 2, 2026.]

Relativity packed RelFest Chicago with nonstop education and networking, and with more eDiscovery people per square inch than I have seen in a long time. With education punctuated by meals and libations, the event felt like a sumptuous banquet with the sharpest minds and warmest hearts.

Appetizer: The Lobby

I ran into Ruth Hauswirth of Cooley both coming and going; Bob Ambrogi of LawSites and LawNext; Jess Moore of HaystackID; Cat Casey of Intelligent AF; Joe Bartolo of Discernis; and the ubiquitous Rob Lekowski of X1, sporting selfies with Chris Cameron of PLUSnxt and Laura Webster of Relativity. EDRM Trusted Partner K L McKinney’s Khrys McKinney accompanied me through almost the whole meal.

Amuse-Bouche: Session Prep

Relativity’s Kelly Lohan, orchestrator par excellence, and “Social Steve” Tanner, also of Relativity, mostly perform their magic behind the scenes, but I did peek behind the curtain at the Judicial Panel. Together they set the table for us.

First Course: Judicial Education

The Good Counselor, Relativity’s David Horrigan, led his 13th annual Judicial Panel with his trademark humor, memory for panelists past and caselaw. The Hon. Xavier Rodriguez; the Hon. Allison Goddard; the Hon. William Matthewman; the Hon. Michelle Rick; and the Hon. Dr. Victoria McCloud (ret.) fielded the inquiries with their unique and learned perspectives. The panel covered current AI issues and some case law, including whether AI prompts should be protected as attorney work product. Relativity presented research results about judicial adoption of AI that highlighted differences between the state and federal benches. The panelists thought state judges were early adopters because of resource constraints.

Second Course: Relativity Legal Education Dinner

David Horrigan later hosted Relativity’s famed legal education dinner, where his Judicial Panelists joined I-team podcasters Jonathan Armstrong and Fiona Campbell, ACEDS’ Mike Quartarano, UF Levin College of Law’s Professor Bill Hamilton, eDiscovery Today’s Doug Austin, IDC’s Ryan O’Leary, Above the Law’s Joe Patrice; Minerva26’s Kelly Twigger, Greg Buckles of eDiscovery Journal, DLA Piper’s the Hon. Andrew Peck (ret.), JAMS’ the Hon. James Francis (ret.), an entire table of women judges and ATJustice’s David R. Cohen among many other luminaries.

Vegetables and Accompaniments: EDRM in Action Educational Panel

We had two main educational initiatives at RelFest 2026. The first was to introduce the EDRM 2.0, with the changes to Analysis, Data Acquisition and Information Governance and the addition of Disposition to the model. The second was to celebrate results of the DupeID project’s case studies documenting savings from tens of thousands of dollars in a small case to multiple millions of dollars in larger cases. By identifying email duplicates with the EDRM MIH (MessageID Hash), cross platform and cross border duplicate identification reduces rework and enhances privacy and privilege.

EDRM 2.0 co-Trustee Shannon Bales of Munger, Tolles & Olson presented the new model. Beth Patterson of Australia’s ESP Connect and Matthew Golab of Relativity brought case studies to the EDRM MIH (cross-platform email duplicate identification) explanation, with ATJustice’s Dave Cohen moderating and calling for participation in a new ESI Protocol Project he and Craig Ball are stewarding. Khrys McKinney of KL McKinney represented the AI Ethics & Bias team, and Joy Murao of Practice Aligned Resources (PAR) represented the Testimony Evidence Reference Model team. EDRM 2.0 co-Trustee Stephanie Clerkin of Korein Tillery, Robert Keeling of Redgrave, Chair of the EDRM Global Advisory Council and Relativity’s Cristin Traylor were on simultaneous panels.

Dessert and Drinks: The Fifth Annual RelFest Reception with Ankura

Immediately after the Wednesday panel, our EDRM teams joined our Trusted Partner Ankura for the fifth annual RelFest Reception, hosted by Alex Marjanovic, Senior Managing Director; Beau Towers; and Illumination Zone podcast guests Michael Huber, Chris Marks & Han Lai who were in from Hong Kong. We loved seeing Legaltech News Editor in Chief Rhys Dipshan and his podcast team; Mike Berman, EDRM’s JD Supra Trending Author with his lovely wife Patricia; Right Discovery’s Kevin Clark and the two Dougs (Doug Austin and Doug Kaminski) at the over-capacity gathering. While technically not dessert, the cocktails and heavy passed hors d’oeuvres were outstanding.

Next Day: Stragglers’ Lunch

The next day, sparked by Joy Murao and Khrys McKinney, EDRM hosted an impromptu Stragglers’ Lunch in the tradition of Chris Dale. We promised no speeches, no demos, only conversation. We invited our faculty and EDRM leaders like Infinnium’s Doug Kaminski; DLA Piper’s Judge Andrew Peck (ret.) and Emma Young; Relativity’s Tricia Johnson (Nixt); Holland & Knight’s Manfred Gabriel; Advocacy’s Téo Doremus, Bowe Kurowski of Buchalter, with his son, Scholar Kole Kurowski; Peg Gianuca and Candi Smith of Disney; Diane Diaz of McDonald’s, Beth Patterson of ESP Connect and Ann Marie Johnson of PAR.

Janice Hollman, head of Global Academic Partnerships for Relativity, accompanied by her wonderful sister, brought part of her diverse group of Relativity Scholars to our lunch, where we were able to envision the future of our eDiscovery community. It was wonderful to meet the Scholars and Mentors and to connect them with people who might be able to facilitate their advancement.

We had one short programmatic element. We all introduced ourselves briefly before breaking into unstructured, spontaneous conversations.

Happy Hour with EDRM 2.0 co-Trustee Shannon Bales

I enjoyed another impromptu conversation with Shannon Bales to discuss the future of EDRM 2.0 including what types of thought leadership to encourage and areas to communicate the changes to the framework. We were fortunate to meet Relativity CEO Phil Saunders, whom we thanked, along with his whole crackerjack and welcoming team, for their hospitality and the opportunity to learn and connect.

Ride Home with Former Fiosians

No event is complete for me without the airport reunion of former Fiosians in attendance. Fios was a venture backed startup in the eDIscovery space, later acquired by DTI Global which was finally acquired by Epiq. Mary Bukoski and Dave De Looze, still with Epiq, and Laura Webster, now at Relativity, accompanied me home to PDX, Portland’s award winning newly remodeled airport. Mary, Dave, Laura and Chris Cameron (not on the flight) were about the same age as the Relativity Scholars at the beginning of our eDiscovery journey when we worked together on some of the largest class actions and follow on litigation. Scaling then meant going from GBs per day to GBs per hour. Seeing them in their positions of responsibility and accountability gives me hope for the next generation of eDiscovery professionals, led and mentored by the sharpest minds and warmest hearts.

To reach out to EDRM, send a note to us at info@edrm.net. We’d love to hear from you.

Assisted by GAI and LLM Technologies per EDRM’s GAI and LLM Policy.