This paper focuses on attempts in both German states to cope with the incipient “information crisis” that plagued Big Science. With the Soviet Union having already set a precedent for a centralized national information infrastructure, the GDR followed suit in 1963 by establishing its own Zentralinstitut für Information und Dokumentation. Kindred infrastructures for the collation, dissemination, and translation of information likewise emerged as instruments of planning in the FRG, most notably through the “Information und Dokumentation” (IuD) program (1974–1977). While such schemes can be seen as embodying technocratic modes of governing science and technology, they also began to factor in the reorientation of research policy towards transparency, democratization, and “societal needs.” These largely parallel developments parted ways from the mid-1970s: While deregulation and the growing relevance of PCs shaped dynamics in the FRG, the GDR increasingly suffered from shortages and stagnation. Yet, the vision of public information infrastructures was pushed to the side entirely only in the 1990s. Our paper argues that these trajectories reveal a broader paradox: the very technologies designed to master the information crisis ultimately accelerated the shift toward decentralized, privatized models that undermined the public infrastructures that had sustained them.