A few years ago, researchers at the University of California at Berkeley determined that 93% of all information generated in 1999, the year they studied, was generated in digital form, by computers of some sort. Only 7% originated as something else—as paper, or analog recordings, or smoke signals.

There may come a time when almost all information originates in digital form. What this means is that you are already engaged in electronic discovery. Unless you request and produce only ancient documents or handwriting samples, all the paper you deal with on a daily basis is simply the printed manifestation of electronic files—letters, reports, memos, business records, charts, photographs—nearly everything.