[zeveb]

Even better, research things like ASN.1 and canonical S-expressions. Re. the latter, here are some examples:

    {"hello-world:s": "Hello, world!"} → (hello-world "Hello, world!")
    {"hello-base-sixteen:d16": "48656c6c6f2c20776f726c6421"} → (hello-base-sixteen #48656c6c6f2c20776f726c6421#)
    {"base-sixty-four-is-default:d": "SGVsbG8sIHdvcmxkIQ"} → (base-sixty-four |SGVsbG8sIHdvcmxkIQ|)
    {"hello-signed-int:i": "42"} → (some-int 42)
    Ø → (some-big-int [bigint]|GY0+kwq94p4QRs2j4rHisQLgEN3zsFSZNJrgK+ZFcV0s1ShyMkMFOHip0oRuG7v+TAC7qmDaYSojFbZjNV5dSA==|)
    {"hello-timestamp:t": "2016-10-02T07:31:51Z"}  → (hello-timestamp [timestamp]2016-10-02T07:31:51Z)

Seriously, this is IMHO so clearly good I'm surprised more folks don't agree.

[bascule]

TJSON is ultimately being written in service of a credential format I'm working on (however it will be using a compact binary format isomorphic with TJSON)

The main inspiration for this format is SPKI/SDSI, which was based on S-expressions. As beautiful as you think the S-expression version may be over the (T)JSON, I personally blame the use of S-expressions as one of many reasons SPKI/SDSI failed to gain more widespread traction, and personally think something like TJSON is a lot more likely to gain traction than the second coming of S-expressions. This is, of course, a debatable point, but you won't find me working on Sexp-based formats any time soon.

ASN.1 of course has a sordid history in the credential space as well, often reviled by security experts as the source of frequent vulnerabilities, particularly problematic encodings like BER. I will admit OER is nice, but nobody uses OER and the IETF prefers things be standardized in terms of DER.

"Research things", yes been there, done that.