February 21, 2007
The revolution underway in the guts of the Web
Every now and then, it’s worth pausing to take stock of just how far the technology of the Web has come in the past few years - and, with imaginative application, what the impacts might be on business and everyday life.
Take this example, about the use of XML in financial reporting. Back in 2000, when I first wrote about this, it sounded nice in theory but remote in practice: if financial reports posted to the SEC were created using a proposed mark-up language known as XBRL, then the information in those reports would become machine-readable. Want to compare the research and development spending of all companies in the oil industry? No longer any need to dig through the reports, just hit a button.
That, according to chairman Christopher Cox, is what the SEC has been doing as it combs through reams of filings to track down cases of options backdating. Use of the specialised XML taxonomy for financial reporting is still voluntary, and there’s no word from the SEC about how many companies have adopted it yet, but here at least is concrete evidence of how it is already being applied.
(Update: An SEC spokesman says that 40 US companies are currently using XBRL for their regular filings.)
Incidentally, if you haven’t already seen it this video, posted on YouTube by Michael Wesch of Kansas State University, is a fine explanation of how XML is helping to put the "2.0" in Web 2.0. His succinct formulation: "Form and content are separated." Worth a look. (A glitch means you may not see the video below, in which case click here to view it on YouTube.)
