Putting Identity into a Context
I was excited when I heard that Dave Winer was going to go to the Identity workshop yesterday as I knew he’d hate it and would wake him up to the sad state of the user-centric identity community.
Sure ‘nuf he writes that: “I had no idea what they were talking about.”
Dave points out that when he invented RSS he had control of both sides of the technology; both generating the content and subscribing to it. And Dave rightly points out that the identity space is a mess, its way out of control and there’s just about nothing we can do to change this sorry state.
So maybe now Dave realizes why we’re in the business we’re in.
Sure - every blog should have it’s own “About Me” page - and one could argue that the About Me page is the equivalent of one’s profile page. In fact Mark Pincus tried to convince blogging platforms of that idea for years and that they should use Tribe.net as their profile pages.
But ever since back then (like 2003-2004) I’ve known that for any of these user centric identity principles to take hold - they had to sneak in the side door - under some specific context that wasn’t based upon ‘user centric controlled identity’.
You can’t sell or market identity - by itself. That’s why ID conferences don’t work, ID products don’t sell and all these ID brokers and ID standards set up will never go anywhere until they figure out the CONTEXTS under which identity control matters.
We’re trying to build an ID Hub into a social networking and blogging platform - cause we think moving end-user’s data between these sort of systems (under those user’s control) is important. That’s the context we see.
Scott Cantor has a platform called Shibboleth, one of the most popular implementations of SAML and all this open identity stuff. Know why? Cause it’s used by Internet2 schools to interconnect disparate campuses together and offer all sorts of virtual campus curriculum stuff, etc. So Shiboleth is taking identity and building on top of it.
And how come SixApart - who’s Brad Fitzpatrick invented OpenID - hasn’t even put support for OpenID into VOX or TypePad or made it available through the LiveJournal API calls?
This is a echo chamber reverberating in dogma and hyperbole - waiting for some killer app or solution to come along and get people to care.
But focusing on Identity unto itself - is like………… well I’m not doing that anymore.
Identity is an important piece of the puzzle, but without context - its just fancy technlogy. A solution to no problem.
I agree. The interesting stuff is what portable, user-centric, light-weight identity enables … and that’s not what identity conferences are all about, for better or worse.
I agree. The interesting stuff is what portable, user-centric, light-weight identity enables … and that’s not what identity conferences are all about, for better or worse.
I agree. The interesting stuff is what portable, user-centric, light-weight identity enables … and that’s not what identity conferences are all about, for better or worse.
I too agree.
But I predict that in the next few months:
1. a new identity “solution” will appear, and become popular
2. it will ignore web standards and be gratuitously incompatible with other approaches
3. “Dave invented Identity”
I too agree.
But I predict that in the next few months:
1. a new identity “solution” will appear, and become popular
2. it will ignore web standards and be gratuitously incompatible with other approaches
3. “Dave invented Identity”
I too agree.
But I predict that in the next few months:
1. a new identity “solution” will appear, and become popular
2. it will ignore web standards and be gratuitously incompatible with other approaches
3. “Dave invented Identity”
I’ve always believed that large communities had the critical mass to play and spread the identity meme fastest. What I don’t understand is why they’ve been reluctant to spread this. Yahoo! today, has the critical mass and does spread their identity model through the properties they acquire. MySpace could also play here if it chose.
Paypal, I believe has the most solid model here since identity is tied to a financial instrument, hence enhancing the validity of the identity. Using this for identity wouldn’t necessarily enable the recipient to transact, but could enable user authentication.
The reality I think lies somewhere close to the comments made by Emre Sokullu on the recent Read/Write Web post titled “The Granular Web” (http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/granular_web.php). Specifically note his comments under the section titled “Why are the implementations are low?”. The issues around the identity asset need to be resolved in terms of what it’s value truly is, and how necessary it really is for every one to have this information to gain value fm it.
I’ve always believed that large communities had the critical mass to play and spread the identity meme fastest. What I don’t understand is why they’ve been reluctant to spread this. Yahoo! today, has the critical mass and does spread their identity model through the properties they acquire. MySpace could also play here if it chose.
Paypal, I believe has the most solid model here since identity is tied to a financial instrument, hence enhancing the validity of the identity. Using this for identity wouldn’t necessarily enable the recipient to transact, but could enable user authentication.
The reality I think lies somewhere close to the comments made by Emre Sokullu on the recent Read/Write Web post titled “The Granular Web” (http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/granular_web.php). Specifically note his comments under the section titled “Why are the implementations are low?”. The issues around the identity asset need to be resolved in terms of what it’s value truly is, and how necessary it really is for every one to have this information to gain value fm it.
I’ve always believed that large communities had the critical mass to play and spread the identity meme fastest. What I don’t understand is why they’ve been reluctant to spread this. Yahoo! today, has the critical mass and does spread their identity model through the properties they acquire. MySpace could also play here if it chose.
Paypal, I believe has the most solid model here since identity is tied to a financial instrument, hence enhancing the validity of the identity. Using this for identity wouldn’t necessarily enable the recipient to transact, but could enable user authentication.
The reality I think lies somewhere close to the comments made by Emre Sokullu on the recent Read/Write Web post titled “The Granular Web” (http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/granular_web.php). Specifically note his comments under the section titled “Why are the implementations are low?”. The issues around the identity asset need to be resolved in terms of what it’s value truly is, and how necessary it really is for every one to have this information to gain value fm it.
Trying to build an ID hub into a social networking will not work, because it will result into a social network with no identity or if you will, no culture, so it is a born-dead network.
Trying to build an ID hub into a social networking will not work, because it will result into a social network with no identity or if you will, no culture, so it is a born-dead network.
Trying to build an ID hub into a social networking will not work, because it will result into a social network with no identity or if you will, no culture, so it is a born-dead network.