Feature – not a bug!

As he says, Brad Fitzpatrick “made” the orginal OpenID to solve problems he was facing at Six Apart.  Of course it grew over time, if anyone's opinion counts, it's his.  And here it is:

So Bill Gates just announced earlier this morning (while I was sleeping in / recovering) that Microsoft is supporting OpenID.

When I made OpenID, I intentionally left the method of authentication undefined. (feature, not a bug!)

Now people ask me what I think about Microsoft supporting it, using their InfoCards as the method of authentication…. I think it's great! So far I've seen Kerberos integration for OpenID, voiceprint biometric auth (call a number and read some words), Jabber JID-Ping auth, etc…. all have different trade-offs between convenience and security. But as more people have CardSpace on their machines, users should get both convenience and security. (sorry, I'm not totally up on all the details… just seen demos….)

Anyway, I and others at Six Apart are thrilled to see Microsoft supporting OpenID. Kudos!

Thanks Brad.  For us, its clear that OpenID is a really great technology for doing public identities – the simplicity is stunning.  I really like your work.  OpenID is clearly an important part of the identity metasystem.  We really hope to see the synergy keep expanding.

 

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Kim Cameron

Work on identity.