…hey, this isn't a sports blog, it's an e-discovery blog!  What were you thinking?!?!  Since it's a bit late on the-Friday-before-the-big-day, I know what's being discussed at the water cooler: 1) I can't wait for Super Bowl!, 2) I need to go to the store to get seven-layer bean dip for Super Bowl!, 3) I hate Super Bowl!  Are you getting the common thread, here?  Well fine, I'm going to enjoy Super Bowl, too, but I'm closing my week with a summary of day one of LTNY.  I'll cover day two Monday – and you'll definitely want to check it out since one of the features will be on predictive coding.

On the red-eye, I happened to be sitting next to the only guy on the entire plane who wanted to be awake all night.  So, combining the fact that I'd been awake all-day Sunday as well, by the time I returned to my room Monday night I'd been awake 35 hours!  Coffee notwithstanding, this didn't assist my concentration.  However, I did manage to make it in time for the opening keynote on a subject which is basically the mission statement of this blog; "Legal vs. IT: Turn the Battle into a Solution to Meet Compliance".

Are we in agreement that this theme has been discussed to death?  Ok.  We get it.  IT, Legal – and all the other players – must find a way to cooperate.  This guy at e-Discovery Insights keeps telling us that all the time!  But this was a speech by the Deputy General Counsel of HP – inducing cooperation on a scale of this magnitude is no easy feat, so believe me, I was interested in what he had to say.

I've had a multinational focus of late, so to start out, I attended a session on deploying a global records management program.  KPMG was the example company, with 390,000 employees in 170 countries.  Records management is tough enough when following a dearth of state and federal laws domestically.  Now extrapolate for the world.  Check back with me when you're done.

In the afternoon, I attended a session called "Anatomy of the Case", which took us through an 'event' from start to finish.  Aside from always being an interesting journey, I wanted to go because an attorney from Orrick was on the panel.  Orrick is a unique firm with a heavy emphasis on technology, so I was interested in their story.

There was a final afternoon session, but by then my brain had pretty much given up on me – and I had meetings to attend later that evening, so I decided to give myself a break.

My take on the first day?  To be honest, I was a bit disappointed because I didn't feel that I'd learned anything new.  This doesn't mean the sessions were bad; to the contrary, they were excellent.  They just covered material I was already familiar with, so perhaps I didn't choose well.  Interestingly, one of the experts I spoke with on day two reacted to my comments by saying I should feel really good then, because it must mean that I know a lot.  Certainly I'd like to think that after so many years of doing this, I do know a lot, but one thing has always been clear; there's a lot more to learn.

Luckily, I found that out on day two!

P.S.  I suppose since I lured you here under false pretenses, I'm obligated to provide my Super Bowl pick.  Let me preface this by saying that I have a running bet with the son of some very close friends.  Ciaran is a great kid, however, he's notorious for picking the loser in every Super Bowl as far back as I can remember.  Therefore, with personal loyalties completely in check, my procedure is to find out his pick, then bet against them (this has worked flawlessly for years!).  I call it my "Ciaran Contrarian Super Bowl Calculator".

This year, he chose the Steelers.  Excellent choice, of course, but he'll be wrong.  Therefore, I'm obligated to pick the Packers.