"In general, the corporate world that's required to do this regards it as onerous. They'll use the Republican buzzwords about excessive government regulation," he says.

"You can say what you want about the government, but this is being adopted all over the world," he adds, predicting that XBRL will soon invade financial reporting realms beyond annual and quarterly reporting. "Taxonomies are already being developed for proxy statements and other announcements."

Beyond that, "it's not just numbers. Imagine if our entire medical system was tagged with XBRL," he says. "Obviously that's a ways a way."

Looking even farther into the future, Vanderploeg imagines a day when "corruption will be pushed away," thanks to XBRL-induced transparency. "I hope you won't see fraud anywhere, from welfare to Enron."

In the meantime, ahead of this vision, which he admits is probably some "10 to 20 years away," XBRL is "just in its infancy," he says, a point he must often reiterate when talking to clients.