Open government data (OGD) is commonly referred to as public organizations sharing data for anyone to reuse. Previous research has spent considerable time on understanding the individuals, organizations, socio-technical systems, and resources; included are barriers, risks, and resistance. The validity of the underlying idea is often taken for granted, while in practice, actors follow myths, the rhetoric is paradoxical, and researchers request evidence for the benefits. This study has the purpose of interrogating the OGD idea by using the metaphors of needs, wants, and wishes. Based on an analytical framework, 18 public documents were identified and analysed from various contexts. It is identified that the idea needs (1) implemented principles to make data reusable, (2) data from others, and (3) for data to be needed when actors satisfy other needs; while it wishes (1) reuse of data realizes benefits and (2) public organizations possess large quantities of reusable data. This paper did not identify any wants of the OGD idea. The paper concludes that the OGD idea conflates its principles with data, attaching sought benefits to data for which it is deficient. Giving rise to a situation where the wrong means are related to the wrong ends. This situation is unsatisfactory, as such this paper proposes a new way to understand OGD.