Not So Relevant

A Good Year for OpenID?

Has 2007 been a good year for OpenID? Well, it had its ups and downs, I guess. While it has probably been the year people have reported frequently about it, it didn’t make much waves in terms of adoption. There are many users - thanks to big providers like AOL - but I don’t see many people actually using it. Also some bigger players made announcements to support it earlier this year but haven’t actually implemented it yet (see Chris Messina’s great post about it).

Lack of Adoption

I am not involved with any of the companies Chris is mentioning so it’s basically just speculation why they are not supporting OpenID yet. One reason which comes to mind is probably hype. Many companies announced support when it was in the spotlight. It seemed to be just a matter of time until OpenID became the single sign-on system at least for consumer centric web applications. However each of those companies seemed to be waiting for other companies to make the first step. Quite strange considering that being a first mover should be a company’s aim. AOL has been an exception by turning user profiles into OpenIDs. However it didn’t really push it by press releases and other forms of communication to its customers.

PR?

Yes, is there any PR regarding OpenID? I don’t think so. While OpenID has been mentioned quite often on blogs over the last twelve months there isn’t any visible strategy to expand communication to mainstream media. A marketing mailing list exists but not much is happening there. It’s quiet. Someone correct me if I am wrong.

And by the way, who should do marketing for OpenID anyway? Most companies being part of the OpenID Foundation are small ones that probably don’t have PR resources left to spend on OpenID, albeit OpenID is a core business to some.

Ease of Use

Implementation of OpenID is still difficult. It is strange that I write about OpenID but people cannot comment with their OpenIDs. The reason is simple, though: None of the WordPress plugins have worked for me so far (also one of the reasons why another project I’m involved with hasn’t launched yet). Hopefully Will Norris’ plugin will work when I upgrade WordPress. Also occasionally companies have problems although there are many libraries (PHP, Ruby, Java,…) available to use. Maybe some kind of task force would help, though I am sure the lack of manpower applies here as well.

Outlook

Sounds all too negative? Well, there are a lot of positive aspects as well. OpenID 2.0 and OpenID Attribute Exchange are final; the IPR policy (Update Jan 1: the policy is final as well. Great!) and the Provider Authentication Policy Extension are close to be final as well. Also OpenID is regarded as a building block of social network portability which will help gaining more attention.

2008 will be a crucial year for OpenID, I think. At least two big players have to support it and make their commitment public both to media and their customers. No hidden OpenID login screens anymore but open, upfront support. It has to be a signal for other companies to join. Google’s implementation and communication regarding OpenID enabled comments on Blogger is certainly a positive sign. Customers have to know about it and actually use their OpenID. It won’t be enough to have 300 million or even 500 million potential users of OpenID. There have to be several million people who actually use it regularly.

OpenID is on a good way but needs some extra boost to survive.

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