New ‘OpenID Connect’ Proposal Could Solve Many of the Social Web's Woes
David Recordon, one of the key architects of OpenID and other identity technologies that have emerged over the past five years, has envisioned a new direction for OpenID. — His proposal, which was drafted with input …
Context & Ripple Effects
OpenID entered the debate as a decentralized alternative to proprietary identity systems, but its consumer flow was criticized as bewildering for ordinary users. By late 2009 it was reported to span 1 billion users and 9 million supporting sites, evidence that distribution had outpaced a fully settled user experience.
David Recordon’s proposal gives that installed OpenID base a new design direction. It matters because OpenID’s earlier case for success rested on broad embedding across the web, as described in coverage of its distribution strategy, rather than control by a single identity provider.
First-order effects
- OpenID implementers and relying sites gain a proposed path for evolving the protocol around the social web’s identity problems, under Recordon’s direction.
- Recordon’s proposal puts the user experience weaknesses identified in earlier OpenID coverage at the center of the standard’s next design discussion.
Second-order effects
- Proprietary identity systems from Yahoo, Google, MSN and Facebook Connect face a more clearly articulated open-standard alternative as sites assess which sign-in approach to support.
- OpenID’s network of supporting sites becomes more valuable if a revised approach can convert its existing reach into easier cross-site identity use.
Third-order effects
- If OpenID’s decentralized model can pair broad adoption with a comprehensible user flow, web identity competition shifts from provider-owned accounts toward interoperable trust infrastructure.
- The proposal illustrates that open identity standards must evolve both their technical protocol and their end-user interaction model to challenge platform-controlled sign-in.
The trend: Web identity is moving from standalone sign-in standards toward interoperable trust layers that must compete on both reach and usability.