Requirements- How to collect data?

[Jeff Waegelin]

As I was writing the other "Requirements" question, I came up with a second related question, but I felt it was large enough to justify creation of a second thread.

So, Question #2: How should FSN collect data? What methods and programs should be available? Should FSN have standard programs available for teams to download and use, or should we just provide a standard export format, and let teams run with it? If we make client-side programs, what types of clients should be available? How can we make it easy for teams to get lots of data, and quickly submit it to FSN?

Note: this is not about the data itself, just the methods of collection. If you want to talk about what data to collect, see my first question.