Virtual Identity Dialogue

One of the responses to my previous post on OpenID and Estonia (there's a phrase I never ever expected to write) is this "A Great Thing Going Amok?". That post is from a blog that appears to be about PassPack - an online password manager. I mention this because I personally wonder how much that fact influence's the poster's writing on OpenID.

Overall the author does raise some valid questions about whether it's a good thing that Estonia is using OpenID or that AOL now gives everyone an OpenID.

Personally I think the answers are on Estonia - probably needs more thought.

On AOL - most likely a very good thing for everyone involved.

And the reason is context.

For a national identity system - there needs to be much discussion about the various areas including security, privacy, legal, political and how it will effect the markets.

For an online identity provider and this is perhaps one of AOL's biggest assets, making it easier to use its identities with other networked entities - makes very good business sense not to mention potentially allowing for easier to use online transactions for its members.

And I think AOL should be commended for trying to do this via basically open systems.

Now the strangest bit to the poster's response is the claims the loss of Free Will in the decision by AOL to give every user an OpenID and by Wordpress enabling OpenID on their blog (the PassPack blog is hosted on Wordpress).

 I can't quite figure out um, how, um, giving people you know more features - constitutes "Loss of Free Will".

Generally speaking - having more choices is usually a good thing.

And a basic tenet behind OpenID (and user-centric identity in general) is that you can have multiple identities online which again, gives you more choice about how you wish to exercise your "free will" online.

So yes, it puzzles me how any can claim "Loss of Free Will" in regards to OpenID....