In Case You Missed It (April 28 – May 4, 2008)

News stories from the week of April 28, 2008 that piqued our interest:

Tutorial pushed for preserving public records
The News and Observer, May 1, 2008

When you’re dealing with countless electronic records everyday, as state and local government agencies do, it can be hard to determine which electronic records should be saved. That’s why a North Carolina State Advisory Committee is supporting a computerized training tutorial and quiz for state government workers. The goal is to help employees determine which emails should be retained and which ones can be deleted safely.

“A 40-minute online tutorial for government workers could be ready in a few months and would cost the state no more than $30,000, said George Bakolia, the state's chief information officer.”

Creating online tutorials about email preservation is an interesting step toward e-discovery compliance, one that we’re pleasantly pleased to see. Separating important emails from junk can be difficult, especially when you’re dealing with high-profile government communications like officials typically do, and we’ve seen plenty of examples where critical e-mails have been deleted. You may remember that North Carolina’s Governor Mike Easley was under fire last month for allegedly having officials in his administration delete emails that should have been saved. This move, along with the email panel he created, should help repair his reputation on public records keeping.

The Big Divide Between E-Discovery in the U.K. and The U.S.
Ride the Lightning, May 2, 2008

On a recent trip to the U.K., this blogger took the time to compare the country’s process of e-discovery to that in the U.S. After conversing with a variety of professionals, the blogger concluded that U.K. e-discovery is principles based, while the U.S. is rules based.

In the U.K., attorneys who are caught in a lie after claiming to have disclosed all relevant information, are punished by disbarment. The effect is that U.K. attorneys stay true to ethical standards and make sure their clients do as well. On the contrary, in the U.S. it takes quite a few mistakes for someone to get disbarred, which allows (and even sometimes encourages) them to take risky chances with falsifying or “losing” crucial evidence.

This writer plans to summarize her notes from her interviews, so check back soon to read an updated post. In the meantime, what are your thoughts on this topic? Do you think the U.S. should adopt some of the standards that the U.K. currently supports? Are U.K. legal professionals really more ethical that U.S. ones?

Suppliers Suggest White House Email Fixes
Byte and Switch, May 1, 2008

Five million. That’s the number of emails that the White House is accused of losing. When the email system changed after the Clinton administration left office, the automatic email archiving solution embedded within Lotus Notes left with it.

This article details rather precisely the transition from Lotus to Microsoft Exchange and why it’s being blamed by the Bush administration for its email archiving blunder. It also provides commentary from numerous vendors on how the White House can easily and cost effectively archive emails. While the White House’s lost and deleted emails make news, we know that there are many other organizations out there – both large and small – that are facing similar retention and archiving issues and we hope that this story will help both the White House and others realize the importance of email archiving and effective methods for doing so.