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--></style><title>Re: [OpenID] OpenID in India - What stops you from
using O</title></head><body>
<div><font color="#000000">>Your traffic is reluctant to use a URL
as a username, they are just more comfortable with the old traditional
way of having a user name and password</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">This works up until the point where it
turns out that someone else has already taken your username - and the
second one you try, and the third. OpenID, by contrast, prevents
anyone else from taking your username; though the URL pieces such as
"SiteName.com" may be undesirable, you can usually find a
site where "YourFavoriteUserName" is not yet taken, and have
"YourFavoriteUserName.SiteName.com" as your
Identity.</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000"><br></font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">The objection *then* might be "But how
will people know there's a difference between
"YourFavoriteUserName.SiteName.com" and
"YourFavoriteUserName.AnotherSiteName.com"?" - there's
a similar protest here:</font></div>
<div><font
color="#000000">http://www.grc.com/sn/SN-095.txt</font></div>
<div><font color="#000000">And the answer is, of course, the same as
if you have two friends named "Steve"; you don't insist that
one of them pick a different name so you can tell them apart! Even if
both of them are named Steve Gibson, you just find *other* qualities
by which you can tell them apart (such as their physical appearance or
the sound of their voice), so you can distinguish between the two in
person. When you're *not* dealing with them in person, you learn their
handwriting or require them to prove their affiliation with some
website - and you don't need to assume that the Steve Gibson at
"grc.com" is the same as the Steve Gibson at
"EvilSite.com" just because they both share the same name!
What are we, 5-year-olds?</font></div>
<div><font
color="#000000">http://www.schneier.com/paper-pki-ft.txt</font></div>
<div>If the "SiteName.com" part is assigned the place of a
"last name", it may both be easier for a normal user to
understand, and seem less intrusive upon their Identity for its
importance; if the "SiteName.com" is only to specify the
"family" of usernames to which *your* username belongs, it
may be more acceptable. The responsibility of each "family",
in turn, will be to make sure that noone has the same *first* name
within that group, and you can look around for a family to help find
one where your preferred "first name" (username) is not yet
taken, but *which* family you settle on doesn't necessarily mean
anything.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>-Shade</div>
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