Interesting ideas, and they've definitely covered some important points. But I think a public revision control system is the "ideal" interface. The data that

Interesting ideas, and they've definitely covered some important points. But I think a public revision control system is the "ideal" interface. The data that you'd read at data.gov, should be exactly the same vault that is maintained for actual government use. With, for instance, a public Subversion URL, you automatically have complete revision history "for all time" and established ways to tie into the data (e.g. existing pretty-printers and diffing tools). Most important, you can see what is changed, by whom, and when.