<p><span style="color: black;" lang="EN-US">Dear OpenID Community,</span></p>
<p><span style="color: black;" lang="EN-US">I have been working
with Snorri, Founder of OpenID EU Foundation to promote OpenID in India.
Haven't had much head way yet, but we are looking to collect information on why
do startups not want to support OpenID. Can you help us reach all the guys by passing on the following post to them?</span></p>
<h2><span lang="EN-US">What stops you from
using OpenID?</span></h2>
<p><span lang="EN-US">This is a question for all those website owners in India, who
have been around for a while, and those who have started new ventures recently.
Let me list down possible reasons I can think of, as if I were to own a website
targeted towards Indians</span></p>
<ol start="1" type="1"><li><span lang="EN-US">Indian users dont know what
OpenID is</span></li><li><span lang="EN-US">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</span></li><li><span lang="EN-US">You, the website owner, wants to
build a user base. And users signing in via an OpenID aren't really users
that you own (Or atleast thats what you think?)</span></li><li><span lang="EN-US">You don't trust that OpenID
provider is secure enough. You are responsible for any user data, and
don't want the third-party provider to be involved in how secure your user
data is</span></li><li>OpenID implementation is very complicated</li></ol>
<p><span lang="EN-US">I would somewhat agree to the first reason that all Indian
users might not know what OpenID is. But some would — and after all you
still have the old traditional registration form on your website for those
users, right? I would disagree with point 2, because users who are aware of
what OpenID is, of how much pain it saves you, wouldn't mind using it.</span></p>
<p><span lang="EN-US">I would totally disagree with point 3, but that seems to be
the most popular reason in my discussions with various people. A new user
signing in with his or her OpenID is still a new user for you! And its even
more simple for the user, removing the yet-another-registration-form barrier. I
would argue that OpenID is actually a big positive when it comes to acquiring
new users!</span></p>
<p><span lang="EN-US">With the same argument, point 4 is also not totally valid!
A user understands who to trust, and build up that trust over time. With big
players like </span><a href="http://openid.yahoo.com/" target="_blank"><span lang="EN-US">Yahoo providing OpenID</span></a><span lang="EN-US">, I think this
barrier is gone.</span></p>
<p><span lang="EN-US">And if you say OpenID implementation is complicated, you
need to look around. The </span><a href="http://openid.net/developers/" target="_blank"><span lang="EN-US">developers section on openid.net </span></a><span lang="EN-US">could be a good starting point.</span></p>
<p><span lang="EN-US">Do you have more points explaining what will it take for
you to implement OpenID support for your users? Do you have any more pain
points? Tell us! Lets discuss and solve these barriers! I invite you all to
send feedback, either via comments on this </span><a href="http://openid.in/2008/05/18/what-stops-your-from-using-openid/" target="_blank"><span lang="EN-US">blog post</span></a><span lang="EN-US">, or via
email to jeetu [at] openid [dot] in</span></p>
<span lang="EN-US">Read more at </span><a href="http://openid.in/2008/05/18/what-stops-you-from-using-openid/" target="_blank"><span lang="EN-US">http://openid.in/2008/05/18/what-stops-you-from-using-openid/</span></a><span lang="EN-US"><br>
</span><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Regards,<br>Jeetu<br><a href="http://www.cse.iitb.ac.in/~jeetu">http://www.cse.iitb.ac.in/~jeetu</a><br><a href="http://apps.facebook.com/myorkut/">http://apps.facebook.com/myorkut/</a><br>
<br>"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."