Autotech Technologies LP v. Automationdirect.Com, Inc.

248 F.R.D. 556, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 27962, 2008 WL 902957
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. Illinois
DecidedApril 2, 2008
DocketNo. 05 C 5488
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 248 F.R.D. 556 (Autotech Technologies LP v. Automationdirect.Com, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Autotech Technologies LP v. Automationdirect.Com, Inc., 248 F.R.D. 556, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 27962, 2008 WL 902957 (N.D. Ill. 2008).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

JEFFREY COLE, United States Magistrate Judge.

ADC seeks to compel Autotech to produce an electronic copy of a document titled EZ-Toueh File Structure. Autotech has already produced the document in both .PDF format on a compact disc and paper format. Not good enough says ADC, because the document was created with a word processing program and exists in its “native format”— the way it is stored and used in the normal course of business — on a computer at Auto-tech’s offices in Bettendorf, Iowa. ADC wants it in this format because it wants the “metadata” — information ADC claims is within the electronic version of the document including when the document was created, when it was modified, and when it was designated “confidential.”1

ADC explains that this dispute harkens back to the motions to compel responses to interrogatories and document requests it filed in March of 2007. (ADC’s Motion to Compel File Structure Document, at 2-3), which demanded “[e]ach and every document identified in your responses to accompanying interrogatories and/or used or referred to in responding to said interrogatories.” (ADC’s Memorandum in Support of Its Motion to Compel Responsive Answers (Dkt. # 294), at 10; Ex. 2). The motion was granted in part — as to interrogatory answers — on September 12, 2007, and the parties were direct[558]*558ed to confer in good faith over the discovery dispute.

Autotech employees, Dick Glover and Michael Horn, submitted their sworn declarations as to their efforts to provide ADC with the file at issue. (Autotech’s Response to ADC’s Motion to Compel, Ex. 2). They saved two electronic files — specifically, two Microsoft Word documents — to a compact disc. (Id., Deck of Richard Glover, ¶ 2; Deck of Michael Horn, ¶ 2). The files came directly from Autotech’s engineering server, where they are kept in the ordinary course of business. No change was made to the documents, their contents or their metadata during the process of “burning” the electronic files to compact disc. (Deck of Richard Glover, ¶ 3; Deck of Michael Horn, ¶¶ 3-4).

One of the two Microsoft Word documents contained the text of Autotech’s “PGI” file structure. PGI is the operator interface program Autotech employed to create the EZTouch panel. Autoteeh calls it the predecessor or forerunner of the EZTouch file structure. The creation and history of these computer files dates back to approximately 1991. As Autotech’s employees did not use Word in the early 1990s, the PGI file structure was most likely written in some type of a word processing program other than Microsoft Word and was converted to a Word format sometime in the mid 1990s. (Deck of Richard Glover, ¶ 4).

The second Microsoft Word documents contained the text of Autoteeh’s current file structure for the EZTouch panel. It is the only EZTouch file structure document Auto-tech maintains. Autotech does not, and historically has not, independently preserved older files at the time of revision. That is to say, as the EZTouch file structure has been changed and updated, each newer version of the file structure document has been added over the top of the previous version. Nevertheless, one can follow a chronological history of changes to the file structure by viewing the face of the document itself. Pages 7-15 provide the “Document Modification History.” It is a chronological list of all changes that have been made since the EZTouch file structure was created from the PGI design document on February 9, 2000. Prior history and contents of this document are contained in the PGI file structure document described above. (Deck of Michael Horn, ¶ 5).

As the instant motion makes clear, ADC is not satisfied with the efforts of Mssrs. Glover and Horn. It complains that the file was not produced in its native format — a Microsoft Word document on an engineering computer at Autotech’s offices — but in .PDF, or portable document format, and a hard copy. The problem with that, According to ADC, is that these format do not contain metadata which would show the electronic history of the document, especially when the document was first created, and when the document was designated “confidential.”

Fed.R.Civ.P. 34(b)(2)(E) controls the production of electronically stored information:

(E) Producing the Documents or Electronically Stored Information. Unless otherwise stipulated or ordered by the court, these procedures apply to producing documents or electronically stored information:
(i) A party must produce documents as they are kept in the usual course of business or must organize and label them to correspond to the categories in the request;
(ii) If a request does not specify a form for producing electronically stored information, a party must produce it in a form or forms in which it is ordinarily maintained or in a reasonably usable form or forms; and
(iii) A party need not produce the same electronically stored information in more than one form.

Here, ADC did not specify a form for the production of the document at issue, so Auto-tech had the option of producing it in the form in which it was ordinarily maintained, or in a reasonably usable form.2

[559]*559ADC argues that the document at issue was converted from Microsoft Word to .PDF; ie. that it was not produced in the form in which it was ordinarily maintained. But that is all it is — an argument — and ADC does not provide evidence, such as an affidavit to support its version of the production. An uncorroborated statement in a brief doesn’t count. See IFC Credit Corp. v. Aliano Brothers General Contractors, Inc., 437 F.3d 606, 610-611 (7th Cir.2006); Clarus Transphase Scientific, Inc. v. Q-Ray, Inc., 2006 WL 4013750, *12 (N.D.Ill. Oct.6, 2006). As of March 12, 2008, about two weeks after filing this motion to compel, counsel for ADC had only performed a “cursory review” — his term — of the documents on the compact disc. (Autotech’s Response to ADC’s Motion to Compel, Ex. 1). At that time, he indicated in an email to Autotech’s counsel that he was “having further analysis done on the materials,” but that he did “not believe that the original Word files have been provided....” (Id.).

Autotech has for its support the sworn declarations of Mssrs. Glover and Horn who state that the Microsoft Word file was saved onto a compact disc, and that no changes were made to the files in the process of moving them to the disc. Yet, in its response brief, Autotech says that it “provided both paper and ‘.pdf versions of Autotech’s EZ-Touch file structure document, implying that the file was converted to .pdf to move it to the disc.” (Autotech’s Response to ADC’s Motion to Compel, at 1). Perhaps this was an error, as on the following page, Autotech says the files were saved to disc in their native format, Microsoft Word. (Id., at 2).

If the document on the disc is a Microsoft Word file, and Mssrs. Glover and Horn are taken at their word that no changes were made to it, this dispute is at an end. Auto-tech’s production of the file complies with Fed.R.Civ.P.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
248 F.R.D. 556, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 27962, 2008 WL 902957, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/autotech-technologies-lp-v-automationdirectcom-inc-ilnd-2008.