Tag Archives: XBRL

A View from the CLOUD: The Shape of Finance (Interactive Biz Reporting Magazine)

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IBR View from CLOUD

During the 22nd XBRL International Conference in Brussels, Belgium from May 17-19, 2011, I had the privilege of speaking on how a CLOUD-enabled Internet could propel the advance of XBRL even further. At the conference, the inaugural issue of Interactive Business Reporting magazine was available. After speaking with its editors, I had the privilege of “penning” an article for Issue 2 (page 38). The first two paragraphs from the article frame the rest of the thinking:

For the past several centuries, we have organized our world of knowledge on paper.  During SWIFT’s annual global financial conference, Sibos, in Amsterdam in October 2010, I reflected on how this world of paper leads to a shape of finance and the implications of the ‘cloud’  on the way we perceive money.  During XBRL22 in Brussels this past May, I began to ask the same question about our financial reports and whether they, too, are ‘shaped’ by the way in which we organize our world of information. Is the full promise of interactive business reporting being held back by a similar ‘physical geography of knowledge?”

XBRL – Is its Full Potential Trapped by its Name?

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For those that have followed CLOUD for the last several months, you already know that our vision is not only bold, but that it is blessed by some “bright lights” in the XBRL community.  From my college friend and the the Sr. Advisor to former Chairman Cox at the SEC, Paul Wilkinson, who is our Chief Strategy Officer, to Charlie Hoffman, the “father of XBRL,” who is a member of our strategic advisory board, CLOUD is fortunate to share some common blood lines with the eXtensible Business Reporting Language.  As I sit here on my flight to Philadelphia for the XBRL US conference, I am getting excited about being knee deep in the topic and the community for the next few days.  As I make the trip, however, I have not been able to shake this nagging question that I’ve had since I first picked up Charlie and Liv’s book, “XBRL for Dummies.”  Is the full potential and future success of XBRL trapped by its name? Continue Reading →

When Standards Interact: A CLOUD-Inspired Future for XBRL

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During a recent trip to Seattle, I had the pleasure of sitting down for lunch with Charlie Hoffman, father of XBRL. Paul Wilkinson, Chief Strategy Officer for CLOUD and former Sr. Adviser to Chairman Cox at the SEC, had introduced us, and we’ve had a few good phone conversations over the past year about CLOUD and XBRL.

During our lunch, Charlie had an interesting reaction to CLOUD, describing it as the “logical model for the semantic web.” That lunch conversation, plus my reading of his and Liv Watson’s excellent book, “XBRL for Dummies,” have sparked some interesting thoughts about ways in which CLOUD and XBRL might interact in practical ways.

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