I'd consider that an extension of the "object database" approach mentioned. Just as you mention the application needs to decode (and encode and deal with missin

I'd consider that an extension of the "object database" approach mentioned. Just as you mention the application needs to decode (and encode and deal with missing fields) that JSON. And probably in any sufficient size of application you'd have to do this decode/encode in more than one place. That JSON encoding/decoding is a "variation" (more explicitly, a reshaping operation). The engineering costs of having variations strewn across your source code hasn't disappeared.