Leen, Peggy A., United States Magistrate Judge
This is the first of four opinions in this case concerning discovery of ESI. The trial court denied plaintiff’s motion to compel seeking all changes made to a screenplay in native format in a case involving the alleged misappropriation of a screenplay. (Defendants wrote the Broadway musical Jersey Boys based on the autobiography.)
Plaintiff sought to compel disclosure of all changes made to the screenplay, and thus wanted all scripts and drafts in native file format. However, defendants produced all of the documents in PDF format. Defendants also produced only two comments made using the notes function of the Screenwriter software that was used to create the screenplay. Defendants objected to producing any files in native format because it would be “needlessly burdensome and duplicative,” and plaintiff already had any information that the native files might contain.
The court held that plaintiff was not entitled to native format because PDF is a “reasonably usable format.” In doing so, the court noted that FRCP 34(b)(2)(E)(iii) states that defendants “need not produce the same electronically stored information in more than one form.”
Defendants in the case also sought to limit discovery to documents produced up until the show debuted on Broadway. The court agreed that a limitation is often necessary and that some of the requests should be limited, but refused to agree to an across the board limit on scope and instead ordered that defendants use search terms and “parameters reasonably tailored to identify responsive communications” to ferret out unresponsive information.
The trial court also denied defendants’ pending motion for protective order because counsel failed to meet and confer with plaintiff’s counsel as required by Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 37.
v.
Thomas Gaetano DEVITO, et al., Defendants