>The amount of meta-work required to consolidate and annotate data we collect, in order to prepare it for public consumption, seems likely to hurt government efficiency.
I (briefly) thought the same thing when I first read about it, but I think the efficiency gained from having digital, standardized formats will eventually outweigh the inefficiencies of the initial conversion to that format.
I'm also happy that otherwise "dead" data (e.g. papers sitting in boxes in a basement somewhere) could now be used more effectively in aggregate to further increase operating efficiencies. Imagine trying to put together a comparison between a specific subset of finance reports across departments when Department A uses one digital format, Department B uses another digital format, and Departments C through Z all have them in boxes. What would have otherwise been a beaurocratic headache _before you even get to data munging_ now becomes an ordeal that's easier on all fronts, and that data can then be used to fight back against otherwise unknown inefficiencies.
I (briefly) thought the same thing when I first read about it, but I think the efficiency gained from having digital, standardized formats will eventually outweigh the inefficiencies of the initial conversion to that format.
I'm also happy that otherwise "dead" data (e.g. papers sitting in boxes in a basement somewhere) could now be used more effectively in aggregate to further increase operating efficiencies. Imagine trying to put together a comparison between a specific subset of finance reports across departments when Department A uses one digital format, Department B uses another digital format, and Departments C through Z all have them in boxes. What would have otherwise been a beaurocratic headache _before you even get to data munging_ now becomes an ordeal that's easier on all fronts, and that data can then be used to fight back against otherwise unknown inefficiencies.