Electronic iscovery, or "e-discovery", refers to discovery in civil litigation which deals with information in electronic form. In this context, electronic form is the representation of information as binary numbers. Electronic information is different from paper information because of its intangible form, volume, transience, and persistence. Also, electronic information is usually accompanied by metadata, which is rarely present in paper information. Electronic discovery poses new challenges and opportunities for attorneys, their clients, technical advisors, and the courts, as electronic information is collected, reviewed and produced. Electronic discovery is the subject of amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure which are effective December 1, 2006. shows the changes, the complete Rules, where in particular rules 16 and 26 are of interest to electronic discovery, are at