There's definitely a middle ground, though, and regulating FOIA to prevent abuse would do well in avoiding situations like /r/floridaman. It's not what the spirit of FOIA is for, so penalties (eg, requests are handled slower, as IL does) should definitely happen.

Chicago's FOIA officers seem to be pretty good with not giving too much information out, but they slip sometimes. Some other data I have includes all of Chicago's parking tickets, including license plates, but the only reason I was able to get that was because of a slipup that resulted in the tribune getting all red light camera ticket's license plate info.

If they'd followed foia properly there, I wouldn't have been able to get license plates. That, and it would've been within reason if they rejected my request for plate info, so I'd've just moved on.

Definitely slippery slope territory, though.