Starting today (August 23rd): 32nd Annual International Legal Technology Association (ILTA)

The 32nd annual educational conference of the International Legal Technology Association (ILTA) starts today, August 23rd.   This year it is at the Gaylord National just outside Washington, DC in National Harbor, Maryland.

It is considered one of the premier events for ILTA members and decision-makers to come together to share their experiences as technology leaders to talk about how they best use leading technologies, and how to best optimize the value of IT in law firms and law departments.

And given the explosion of work in Europe (click here) and growing work in Asia (click here) which we have reported extensively, there will be much to learn.

It is a four day event and the Posse List team will cover as much as it can.   Content goes across 26 tracks, and it is regarded as the place to make connections.    The registation fees are going to be out of the price range for many Posse List members to be able to attend.  So we will cover as much as we can.   Through the courtesy of Peggy Wechsler, Program Director for ILTA, we have been granted several media credentials for members of our staff to attend and our colleagues at Mayer Brown will be providing us additional material. 

But the Exhibit Hall (there will be 180+ vendor booths) is the place for Posse List members to see and to connect.  To see the current list of vendors click here.   There are Platinum, Gold, Silver, Bronze and Basic Sponsors.   Contact them to obtain exhibit hall passes (click here).

As we have posted, we are working in a part of the legal industry that is unusual because it is open to sharing and collaboration, through publications, quality conferences, and trade shows, and peer networking organizations such as ILTA, LegalTech, ABATech and the ILSL Conference.

Posse List members are a vast store of untapped creativity, expertise, and wisdom.  We all know that.  Go out and make connections.   Show people your value, your worth.  Don’t be negative.  And review our suggestions to “get out there” (click here).

And keep in mind the trend we first reported last year and that has continued to grow.  It’s the movement of the lawyers who know the most about EDD and who are the best at EDD who have moved out of law firms and into the employ of EDD service providers.   This “tectonic shift” is probably yielding a long-term result where EDD service providers will largely taking this work away from law firms and EDD will no longer be considered part of the ordinary practice of law, leaving litigation lawyers to redefine what they actually do as clients route around them to the EDD service providers who have all of the talent.

And it affects the contract attorney world.  Because one thing we have heard over and over has been amore direct trend affecting contract attorneys:  law firms and corporations have begun asking e-discovery companies and vertically integrated staffing agencies whether they can provide “enterprise wide” e-discovery solutions: managing and/or staffing projects for a law firm or corporation in any of its offices across the U.S. and/or across the globe.  Can they be “the one” vendor?  And part of this is due to a sub-trend: doing the doc reviews “local” in Europe and Asia because of blocking statute rules and data privacy.

But more importantly, going to e-discovery companies – the folks processing the data from the start – and asking “…and can you staff the review?”  Which is why companies like Catalyst, eTERA, Trilantic, etc. are landing document review work.

We will be highlighting a number of vendors next week but to start two important vendors and major sponsors of ILTA:

* Catalyst Repository Systems  (click here)  — vendor of the industry leading review platform Catalyst CR

*  Fios Inc. (click here) — providing comprehensive services and expert guidance that transform the burdensome nature of electronic discovery into a streamlined, legally defensible business process.