eDiscovery Daily Blog

• February 9, 2015

Did you attend LegalTech® New York 2015 (LTNY) last week? We did, and for the fifth year in a row(!), we interviewed several industry thought leaders to get their thoughts on the significant trends for 2015. We will be publishing a schedule for those interviews in the next few days and will publish those interviews over the next few weeks. As for the show itself, as I fly back from NYC (after my weekend here with my lovely wife!), here are some of my miscellaneous observations.

Weather: For the second year in a row, weather caused significant travel delays and cancelled flights. Some were delayed for several hours in arriving, while others never made it at all. Should American Lawyer Media (ALM) consider moving LTNY to a different time of year to minimize the travel issues? That was one question that I asked the thought leaders and I got varied responses (more to come on that). Despite the weather issues, LTNY seemed to be better attended than last year, at least based on my conversation with others who made it to the show both years.

Although I was in that group that was delayed for several hours, at least I made it this year! 🙂

Hilton and the demise of the Lobby Lounge: For those of us who have been coming to LTNY for years and look to have meetings there, we have gotten used to the Hilton layout and the availability of the lounge beyond the lobby and the Bridges bar for available seating for those meetings. For the meetings that I had scheduled, I had proposed the lobby lounge as the location (you could usually get a seat in there if you were patient). Imagine my surprise to find that the lobby lounge had been removed and replaced by a much smaller executive lounge (which was only open to hotel guests). Furthermore, the Bridges bar was reserved by ALM for private events the entire show and other options (such as the hotel restaurant) were diminished too. Obviously, ALM has no control over the removal of the lobby lounge, but, hopefully next year, they will avoid reserving the Bridges bar again. Meetings are an important part of the show and you need places to meet.

Free Judges Panel Sessions: Kudos to ALM, however, for scheduling three free judges panel sessions that were CLE or Ethics credit eligible, that included several notable judges, including Judge Andrew J. Peck, Judge James C. Francis and Judge Frank Maas of New York, Ronald J. Hedges (Former New Jersey Magistrate Judge), Judge Elizabeth D. LaPorte of California and the retired Judge John Facciola of the District of Columbia. The sessions gave all attendees the opportunity to hear the judges’ viewpoints about key cases in 2014 that dealt with spoliation sanctions, their thoughts about why the proposed FRCP amendments may not change anything and what’s wrong with discovery and how attorneys (and even judges) address it. Terrific information for those who attended.

In the What’s Wrong with Discovery session, Judge Facciola had (in my opinion) the quote of the show in discussing attorneys’ failure to limit the scope of documents for review in discovery when he said “I want attorneys that go for the jugular, not those who go for the capillaries.” Good stuff.

So, what do you think? Did you attend LTNY last week? What are your thoughts about the show? Please share any comments you might have or if you’d like to know more about a particular topic.

Disclaimer: The views represented herein are exclusively the views of the author, and do not necessarily represent the views held by CloudNine. eDiscoveryDaily is made available by CloudNine solely for educational purposes to provide general information about general eDiscovery principles and not to provide specific legal advice applicable to any particular circumstance. eDiscoveryDaily should not be used as a substitute for competent legal advice from a lawyer you have retained and who has agreed to represent you.