An attempt by the e-discovery industry to standardize how applications share data has gained only modest adoption, and although technical improvements are planned, there are mixed opinions about the project’s long-term prospects.
Version 1.0 of the specification, EDRM-XML, debuted from the Electronic Discovery Reference Model organization in February 2008 after being proposed in March 2007. Load files are a common input/output method for e-discovery data. By replacing proprietary approaches with a version built on openly published code, the data becomes more accessible, officials promised. Future versions could also allow users to customize or expand the blueprint as needed, they said.
Three years and six months later, vendor adoption of the specification, now in version 1.2, is notable on a surface level but less so in real-world use. There are 24 companies listed on the project website as having at least one compliant product, but none actively call for their customers to use EDRM-XML as the primary method of moving data. Most remain content using Concordance and Summation load files. Another 14 companies are listed as participants, although officials acknowledge that participating has the minimum requirement of simply being on a conference call.
“It has not been as widely used as we would like to see. But I think that’s not really that different from what we were anticipating would be the case,” EDRM co-founder and legal technology expert George Socha said, citing industry indifference as the standard’s biggest obstacle. “One barrier to adoption is inertia,” he said, from St. Paul, Minn.
