11–20 of 39 posts
BrowserID, however, has now fixed most of these issues, and it's very straightforward to use. To try it out, you can have a look at http://www.yourpane.com/
And why wouldn't I prefer to have a set of fully independent, unlinked accounts at different sites? If I understand correctly, using OpenID means that Site A can confirm that User X is the same as User X on Site B, using OpenID? I can see where that's a win for sites A & B. I can also see many instances where that is not a win for me.
Of course, in reality, both sites will request your email address, so they can figure it out anyway.
The reason you dont see it mainstream is because for someone like my mom its too difficult to understand. She does however understand "Login with Facebook/Google/Twitter" because it is simple, one click, approve permissions and done. Anything more is just a hassle for them to remember and they will fallback to email/password instead.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you use the same e-mail address to sign up for both sites, they can already determine this. The only way to get the anonymity you want is to create new throwaway accounts for each service. (I realize GMail lets you do things like + aliases, but these should be stripped when trying to match up users across databases.)
Or run your own mailserver and hand out email addresses like servicename @ [yourmailserver].com Everything gets forwarded to the same inbox. tuffmail.com is awesome and cheap; I'm a happy subscriber.
It's common knowledge now that OpenID has severe usability problems. As much as I wanted it to work, none of my apps' visitors (hell, back in 2006) could understand what it was or how to use it. BrowserID, however, has now fixed most of these issues, and it's very straightforward to use. To try it out, you can have a look at http://www.yourpane.com/
1) I would go to a website, it would ask me to register or sign in with "OpenID". It would tell me a little bit about OpenID "Yahoo, ___, and ___ are OpenID providers. If you have a Yahoo ID then you have an Open ID".
2) WTF is the point of an OpenID then?! If I could just sign in with a Yahoo account I thought...
3) I try to sign in with my Yahoo ID like it said. It fails every time. WTF.
4) I go back to Yahoo to GET an OpenID. It tells me I already have one. I try to get one from other "providers" and somewhere along the way I always get misdirected or the sign up / registration process just fails and I just get sick of the whole OpenID-Mind-Game and sign in with my facebook account.
After 3 or 4 mind games I became extremely frustrated and soulfully HATED OpenID. It was all over the place, I didn't get it. It couldn't work for me. So I felt like it was a feature I was not allowed to have. Just thinking of the OpenID logo and name evokes feelings of annoyance. So the brand is trashed is what I'm saying.
It's common knowledge now that OpenID has severe usability problems. As much as I wanted it to work, none of my apps' visitors (hell, back in 2006) could understand what it was or how to use it. BrowserID, however, has now fixed most of these issues, and it's very straightforward to use. To try it out, you can have a look at http://www.yourpane.com/
In what world is that more usable than "Click here to login with Google / Yahoo"?
And why wouldn't I prefer to have a set of fully independent, unlinked accounts at different sites? If I understand correctly, using OpenID means that Site A can confirm that User X is the same as User X on Site B, using OpenID? I can see where that's a win for sites A & B. I can also see many instances where that is not a win for me.
How is this different than correlating user names or email addresses? Especially given that most of the OpenIds out in the wild are specifically keyed off of email addresses anyway.
It's common knowledge now that OpenID has severe usability problems. As much as I wanted it to work, none of my apps' visitors (hell, back in 2006) could understand what it was or how to use it. BrowserID, however, has now fixed most of these issues, and it's very straightforward to use. To try it out, you can have a look at http://www.yourpane.com/
"To log in, just enter your email address below and click the link that we send you. To log in again, you can save the link and use it directly (you don't have to request a new one)." In what world is that more usable than "Click here to login with Google / Yahoo"?
It's common knowledge now that OpenID has severe usability problems. As much as I wanted it to work, none of my apps' visitors (hell, back in 2006) could understand what it was or how to use it. BrowserID, however, has now fixed most of these issues, and it's very straightforward to use. To try it out, you can have a look at http://www.yourpane.com/
I just never understood how the hell it worked. 1) I would go to a website, it would ask me to register or sign in with "OpenID". It would tell me a little bit about OpenID "Yahoo, ___, and ___ are OpenID providers. If you have a Yahoo ID then you have an Open ID". 2) WTF is the point of an OpenID then?! If I could just sign in with a Yahoo account I thought... 3) I try to sign in with my Yahoo ID like it said. It fa…
And the so-called "informational" documentation on the OpenID project site is ... vague to the extreme, and that's being charitable.
While it's fine abstracting away technical information from users who don't want it, if you're going to create a Grand Unifying Identity Service, you're going to get much better buy-in from those who do care to find out about how things work under the hood, if you make it possible to do so (and without reading the source / diving fully into the developer docs).
OpenID is a trust dud.
* because the user experience really requires you to have the "nascar effect" of several well-known icons. OpenID could scale horizontally technically but in fact it doesn't work that way. Except for a few providers (like Google) it is not "peer to peer" (many to many) but more like "business to customers" (one to many) relation
* because the "like"-generation beloved blue button talks something else (and is "way more important" than some technical nice thing)
* because it requires putting too many eggs in one basket (one ID to rule them all. And even "the few big ones" are these days hacked without problems)
* because your database of users is your asset (at least in the US). In EU it is more often a liability. * As this is an asset, nobody wants to pay anything for a secure identity as a TTP service.
* because it forbids "sensible" use on mobile devices (I have a phone and a PC, I would like to link my phone(s) to my services through numbers rather than on-phone cumbersome username or openid hack)
* pairing with a QR code works well for me. It even allows to establish a more meaningful key for further communication (I check the "green bar" of the browser than the underlying, semi-anonymous, DNS-depending OpenID)
* because OpenID does not really work for anything than medium-security identification transport. I hope my bank will never use an OpenID to authenticate anything.
* just try a new service with a throwaway account. or a throwaway password. Maybe one day people build services, which do not require pairing to "something" at all. Or Just use "click-the-link-in-e-mail-or-copy-token" approach.