Regulators are embracing it. Supporters are raving about it. CFOs are coming around ... albeit slowly.
But XBRL's skeptics continue to make a lot of noise in their own right.
"Critics have called the introduction of extensible business-reporting language, or XBRL, a boon for consultancies and regulators but a pain for practitioners," writes CFO.com's Alan Rappeport in an article that puts XBRL skeptics at center stage. "... Proponents hope it will make financial data easier to sort and analyze, but others see it as an expensive gimmick."
Their objections might fall on deaf ears. XBRL could be the law of the land sooner rather than later.
What's your opinion? Will XBRL be a boon or a bust?
XBRL Boon or Bust? At EDGAR Online we have seen first-hand how XBRL can grow and enhance our products and business so are firm believers that XBRL will be a boon not just for regulators, but for the CFO, CPA and CFA as well. XBRL powers many of our data products and services and is the backbone technology for our delivery of the highest quality financial information. Customers are responding and seeing the benefits and our business is growing as a direct result. We also don't see great additonal expense to end users, even on the XBRL filing side. As just one example, RR Donnelly offers a very cost effective XBRL filing solution for companies to participate in the SEC's voluntary filing program.
Posted by: Sue Childs | January 10, 2008 at 02:10 PM