[OpenID] OpenID based on email addresses... Just Works!

[Martin Atkins]

David Fuelling wrote:
> 
>     That sounds more like an argument for you to use
>     http://sappenin.com/ as your identifier instead of an email address.
> 
>     If you want to use a HTTP URL for your identifier, just enter that
>     URL into the RP directly!
> 
> 
> For me, an internet-savvy, genius technology person (tongue-in-cheek), 
> you're right.  I know what it means to use the URL, and I do.  However, 
> my grandmother, who's a little bit less tech-savvy (she still calls the 
> Internet "email"), she has no idea that she should be using a URL, let 
> alone what the distinction is.  We need to be thinking about these 
> people, and about their future freedoms.  Like it or not, people are 
> going to be using email addresses as their primary identifier -- as the 
> designers of this stuff, we need to plan ahead and add flexibility for 
> them ahead of time.
> 

Okay, but I'm not clear how you imagine your grandmother using this. Who 
sets up the URL mapping for her? Where does it map to? I assume from 
your description that your grandmother doesn't own her own domain, so 
all you're doing is pushing the problem a level deeper. How does she 
wrest control from the provider of the domain her URL is under?