CM/ECF To Public: Brother, You Must Now Spare a Dime.

 Some government robot somewhere kind federal employee emailed me this on Friday:

An increase in the electronic public access (EPA) fee, from eight cents to 10 cents per page, will take effect on April 1, 2012.

Earlier this month, the Judicial Conference of the United States authorized an increase in the federal judiciarys electronic public access fee in response to increasing costs for maintaining and enhancing the electronic public access system.

The change is needed to support and improve the Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER) system, and to develop and implement the next generation of the judiciarys Case Management/Electronic Case Filing system.

The EPA fee has not been increased since 2005. As mandated by Congress, the EPA program is funded entirely through user fees set by the Conference. 

Note to RECAP users -- your access is not free, either.

Somebody went ahead and fronted the fee so you can glom on like the cheapskate moocher you are.

But don't worry about me, enjoy the free access (that's my mother impression I've been working on).

Where Were You When PACER Went Down?

I know most good lawyers like to serve their Rule 11/sanctions motions on a Saturday, but you may need to move it up a day, as PACER goes down nationwide this weekend:

There will be nationwide maintenance on the PACER system Saturday, January 14, 2012. The disruptions will begin at 9 AM ET and continue until 6 PM ET. PACER users may have sessions terminated or experience difficulty logging in to the system. CM/ECF filings will be accepted but viewing docket sheets, or reports will be disrupted. We apologize for the inconvenience. 

Listen, don't be upset -- if opposing counsel receives email notification of your motion while having dinner with her family Friday evening, you can have almost the same intended impact!

Here's Your Chance to Complain About PACER!

I know you have a staff of thousands to deal with pesky CM/ECF issues, and probably have numerous "auto-forward" redundancies so that you never miss a deadline ever.

But in the event your keyboard has actually made real live intertubular contact with PACER, you may have a suggestion or two for how to make the danged thing work better.

There is an initiative under way to improve how PACER operates.  It is headed up by Judge J. Rich Leonard, from the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the ED NC, who chairs the perfectly Gov-speaked "Additional Stakeholders Functional Requirements Group" (a/ka ASFRG).

You can fill the survey out anonymously here, or do like me and have the survey automatically forwarded to your secretary and the associate who used to work with you but who left a few months back.

(That should pretty much take care of it.)

Exciting New CM/ECF Developments!

Hi folks, judicial elections are over, so everyone can take a deep breath.

Here's a fun fact from a new Time poll on what Americans believe, as Stephen Colbert likes to say, in our guts:

Twenty-eight percent of voters do not believe Muslims should be eligible to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court. Nearly one-third of the country thinks adherents of Islam should be barred from running for President — a slightly higher percentage than the 24% who mistakenly believe the current occupant of the Oval Office is himself a Muslim. In all, just 47% of respondents believe Obama is a Christian; 24% declined to respond to the question or said they were unsure, and 5% believe he is neither Christian nor Muslim.

Hmm, restrictions on members of a religion holding office or becoming a judge for nothing more than simply being a member of that religion -- that impulse seems vaguely familiar.

Oh well, let's talk about something really exciting -- CM/ECF.

I just got this email from the ND NY, where I sometimes find myself:

The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts has advised us of a prospective change to the technical filing standard associated with our Case Management / Electronic Case Files (CM/ECF) system. Since its inception, the system has required that electronic documents be filed in portable document format (PDF). Now, a move to the new more-controlled PDF/A standard is necessary to enhance CM/ECF security and to improve the archiving and preservation of case-related documents. The Judiciary adopted the PDF format more than fifteen years ago. It serves as an excellent surrogate for paper and offers reliable renderings of court documents for all CM/ECF users despite their many different computer configurations. And the CM/ECF systems nationally now contain nearly five hundred million PDF files.

However, over time, new features that raise security concerns have been added to PDF. A few examples are: the ability for a filer to monitor if and when the document is read (that feature is blocked for documents filed in CM/ECF), and the ability for a filer to incorporate active software programs in the document. Those security concerns, and concerns about ensuring that our electronic documents could be archived and retrieved for decades (even centuries) to come, has led the Judiciary to join with other government agencies, corporations and technologists around the world to develop a new international electronic document standard that addresses those concerns.

That new standard, adopted by the International Organization for Standardization in 2005, is PDF/A.  The Judiciary has delayed implementation of the PDF/A standard until major software vendors provided for the creation of this format in conjunction with standard word processing packages. Ninety software vendors now do so. All versions of CM/ECF accept PDF/A today.

I wanted to alert the Bar to this issue as upcoming releases of CM/ECF will enable courts to require that all documents be filed in PDF/A format. Those new CM/ECF software upgrades will enable each court to control its transition to PDF/A. The goal of the Judiciary is to transition fully to PDF/A.

However, to ease that transition, CM/ECF will enable courts to allow exceptions to the PDF/A requirement so that Courts can file PDF (non/A) documents until the Bar can update their PDF creator software to the PDF/A format. Ideally, exceptions will be made only infrequently and only temporarily.

At this time, the Judiciary has not set a specific target date for requiring that all new documents be filed in PDF/A.   At this point, I am writing to the members of the Bar to alert you to this upcoming change, and to encourage you to start looking at upgrading your software (ie:, Adobe, WordPerfect, Word, etc.,) or devices (ie:, scanners, copier-scanners, etc.) that you use to create PDF documents to the PDF/A format.

What the hail are they talking about?

I understand and fully endorse PDA, but can a tech-savvy reader translate PDF (non/A) into English?

Does this somehow involve metadata or, worse yet, flat bread?

(I know, flat bread is so 2007.)

SFL Friday -- How Does This Work Again?

Well kids it's just too darned nice out there, so I must head into the deep blue water and immerse myself completely, weightless and suspended in time, as wave after wave of tactile sensations wash over me.......

Oops -- was that out loud?

Yep, it's Friday and there are tons of outdoor activities to keep you busy so I hope you do something useful and productive as well as fun.

What the hail is wrong with ABC? (BTW, you can see the banned ad here).

While I'm at it, what the hail is wrong with the ND IL?

On Thursday, Blagojevich's lawyers asked a federal judge to subpoena the president to testify about questions surrounding the government's allegation that Blagojevich was selling or trading Obama's Senate seat after his election to the White House in November 2008.

"President Barack Obama has direct knowledge of the Senate seat allegation," reads Blagojevich's 11-page motion, filed with U.S. District Judge James B. Zagel.

The court erred when it posted the motion in a pdf file with redactions that could be revealed simply by copying and pasting the blacked-out portions to a plain text file.

Blagojevich attorney Sheldon Sorosky brushed off the error, telling Fox News that he didn't know how the redacted file became viewable, and blaming it on a "low tech guy."

Some news outlets captured the file, which was later removed from the court's website.

Click here to read the motion.

This is beyond stupid -- how many times have we been warned about this, yet it manages to happen accidentally on a motion that relates to the President?

Who's in charge of CM/ECF over at the ND IL -- Justice Kennedy?

Before I leave, don't forget to do your part to fight earthquakes, try to act like your favorite married star, and of course get a good night's sleep.

Have a great weekend everybody!