The advent of deep, wide, accurate, digital photometric surveys exemplified by the Sloan
Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) has had a profound impact on studies of the Milky Way. In the
past decade, we have transitioned from a scarcity to an (over)abundance of precise, well
calibrated, observations of stars over a large fraction of the Galaxy. The avalanche of
data will continue throughout this decade, culminating with Gaia and LSST. This new
reality will necessitate changes in methodology, habits, and expectations both on the side
of the large survey projects as well as the astrophysics community at large. We argue,
based on the experience with SDSS, that surveys should release data as early and often as
possible incorporating incremental improvements in each subsequent release, as opposed to
holding off for a single, big, final release. The scientific community will need to
reciprocate by performing analyses and (re-analyses) appropriate to the current fidelity
of the released data, understanding that these are continually evolving and improving
products.