Choose open portable formats (Markdown, CSV, JSON) over proprietary — migration cost compounds daily with every new piece of locked-in data

Why This Is a Rule

Every day you use a tool with a proprietary format, your migration cost increases. Day 1 with 10 notes in a proprietary format: migration takes 30 minutes. Year 3 with 2,000 notes: migration takes weeks and may lose formatting, links, or metadata. The migration cost is a compounding liability — each new piece of data added to the locked format increases the cost of eventual departure.

Open formats (Markdown, CSV, JSON, plain text) have zero migration cost at any scale: the files work in any tool that reads those formats. Switching from Obsidian (Markdown) to another Markdown editor requires moving a folder. Switching from a proprietary tool to anything requires a conversion process that may not exist, may lose data, and may require manual correction of every item.

The feature trade-off is real: proprietary tools often offer richer features than open-format tools because proprietary formats can encode more complex structures. But the feature advantage is temporary (open-format tools are constantly improving) while the lock-in cost is permanent (every day deepens it). A slightly less featured tool with full portability is strategically better than a slightly more featured tool with zero portability — because the featured tool's advantage can be erased by a competitor's update, while the locked-in tool's data remains trapped.

When This Fires

• When selecting any tool that will store data you want to keep long-term
• When evaluating a shiny new tool with proprietary format against an adequate open-format alternative
• When conducting Scale tool evaluation effort to switching cost, not feature count — maximum deliberation for high lock-in, minimal for easily replaced tools's switching-cost assessment and finding high lock-in risk
• Complements Scale tool evaluation effort to switching cost, not feature count — maximum deliberation for high lock-in, minimal for easily replaced tools (evaluation effort scales with irreversibility) with the specific criterion that reduces irreversibility

Common Failure Mode

Feature-first selection: "This tool is amazing! It has AI-powered linking, beautiful visualizations, and smart suggestions!" — stored in a proprietary format with no export. Two years and 3,000 notes later, the company pivots, raises prices 5x, or shuts down. Your data is trapped.

The Protocol

(1) For any tool that stores data, check: what format does it use? Markdown, plain text, CSV, JSON → open. Database, proprietary binary, cloud-only → locked. (2) Check export capability: can you export ALL your data in an open format? Test it with a small dataset before committing. (3) If choosing between an open-format tool with adequate features and a proprietary tool with superior features → choose open format unless the feature gap is genuinely critical (not just nice-to-have). (4) For tools already in use with proprietary formats: schedule periodic exports as insurance. Monthly export of all data to open format creates a portable backup even if you can't switch tools today. (5) Rate each tool in your stack 1-5 on migration readiness (Choose open portable formats (Markdown, CSV, JSON) over proprietary — migration cost compounds daily with every new piece of locked-in data's variant). Any tool rated 1-2 (data locked, no export) is a strategic risk requiring replacement consideration.