[oever]

If a file is so large that the processor spends a lot of time parsing, then the file is too large to be conveniently edited by a person.

For large files it is best to use a binary format that can be read quickly without parsing or allocation. https://rkyv.org/ is an example.

Being 'friendly' is not why JSON is popular. JSON is popular because the decoder is included the web browser.

[nerdponx]

Thanks, and good point about dataset size.

I appreciate the thorough "shootout" benchmarks provided by the authors as well!