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Poll: What do you think of OpenID?

news.ycombinator.com

11–20 of 55 posts

Re: Poll: What do you think of OpenID?

#12
The benefit for me is that you get to choose who stores your password. A random website may store my password plaintext, I have no way of knowing -- so I am forced to use different passwords for each site, and manage them some way.

Ofcourse, I _know_ this, but in general, users don't know and don't care. So, OpenID actually makes the web a safer place for inexperienced users, which is I think is rather important.

Re: Poll: What do you think of OpenID?

#14
I didn't think much of it, but after using it for a week, I wish it was used everywhere.

To those of you who haven't used it, try it out before condemning it.

It's really nice to login with the click of a button (no typing usernames and passwords) and signing up is usually a one click action as well.

Re: Poll: What do you think of OpenID?

#15
The only option for those of us that use it is "use it on a daily basis". Pretty weak options.

I am always happy when I can use OpenID on a site. It's a really low barrier and guarantees that I won't leave at the sign up form. The only reason I don't use it every day is because the sites I visit every day don't support it.

Re: Poll: What do you think of OpenID?

#18
post #12

The benefit for me is that you get to choose who stores your password. A random website may store my password plaintext, I have no way of knowing -- so I am forced to use different passwords for each site, and manage them some way. Ofcourse, I _know_ this, but in general, users don't know and don't care. So, OpenID actually makes the web a safer place for inexperienced users, which is I think is rather important.

Except the phishing aspects make it worse for inexperienced users, since an arbitrary website can redirect to a page that asks for a potentially more sensitive username/password, and that's actually considered normal flow.

I don't understand how anyone can promote OpenID in good conscience with this glaring hole in the design. You simply can't rely on user education.

Re: Poll: What do you think of OpenID?

#19
post #14

I didn't think much of it, but after using it for a week, I wish it was used everywhere. To those of you who haven't used it, try it out before condemning it. It's really nice to login with the click of a button (no typing usernames and passwords) and signing up is usually a one click action as well.

What's the best way to start for someone who doesn't want their entire internet identity tied with up Yahoo, Google, or Facebook?

Re: Poll: What do you think of OpenID?

#20
I'd much rather have "login with openid" rather than seeing "login with twitter ; login with facebook ; login with posterous" or whichever subset of sites any random service thinks is most valuable to support.

The great thing about login/identity/authentication standards is that there are so many to choose from. Didn't we learn the first time around with web browser capabilities to avoid this kind of fragmentation again?

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