Extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL): A Note on Need to Study XBRL as a Social Artifact

Abstract

XBRL is a language for the electronic communication of business and financial data, which is revolutionizing business reporting around the world. It provides major benefits in the preparation, analysis, and communication of business information. This note takes a foundational step toward a paradigm and suggests how one might usefully augment further studies with research on XBRL as social artifacts. Technological artifacts are physical/material as well as social constructions thus making it plausible to be called social artifacts too. Extensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL) is one such technological artifact functioning as a social construction in the life of an ordinary accountant to a highflying investment banker. The Potential social impact of XBRL is unlike several other closely resembling technological artifacts like object-oriented paradigm in the life cycle of software.

Keywords: XBRL, Social Artifact, Organization, Financial Reporting

JEL Classification: G18, G34, G38, M41, M49