Yahoo! accounts become valid OpenIDs

Yahoo! accounts become valid OpenIDs David Jan 17

13 comments Latest by Chris Peters

Yahoo! is jumping on the OpenID wagon and is making it possible to use your Yahoo! account as a valid OpenID. That’s another quarter of a billion OpenIDs out there! Put that together with the fact that AOL made their AIM logins work as OpenIDs as well and most everyone in the US at least will already have an OpenID.

At 37signals, we love OpenID. We support it in Basecamp, Highrise, and Backpack and have integrated all these applications through OpenID with our OpenBar. Our users seem to love it too. One in ten Highrise users is running with OpenID.

It seems the Yahoo! system is still under development, though. And it does require that systems accept OpenID 2.0, which is the only just-minted new standard (what everyone else in the first rush just implemented was 1.1). So we’ll be making sure that our systems will be ready for OpenID 2.0 and all the new Yahoo!-wielding OpenID users coming on board.

Rock on, OpenID!

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13 comments so far

Chris Kampmeier 17 Jan 08

Any plans to add OpenID support to Campfire and Tadalist? I always feel funny having to remember an email and password for those apps, when the OpenBar gives me quick one-click access to the rest of 37s’ services.

Gleb Zhgun 17 Jan 08

Don’t you think that it is about time for service providers (like Yahoo) to stop becoming open-id providers and start letting users log in with it instead?

Mateusz Drożdżyński 17 Jan 08

Yeah, I’d really love to be able to login to Flickr with my OpenID instead of Yahoo ID. Hopefully their move towards OpenID will eventually be both-ways.

Richard Johnson 17 Jan 08

What is a useful site for learning about OpenID? How does AOL and Yahoo make sure that there are no duplicate names in the OpenID system?

Mike 17 Jan 08

Hmm. I’m confused. I signed for an OpenID because I wanted a “single digital identity” (in the words of openid.net), and I LOVE the OpenBar in 37signals apps. But now, through no fault of my own, I now have THREE OpenID identities – the one I signed up for a year ago, my AIM handle, and my Yahoo account. Do all of these IDs floating around weaken the system, or can I just ignore AOL and Yahoo? Is it possible to merge all of my “single identities” together?

Of course, it may not matter. When I went to Yahoo’s “OpenID home,” here’s the message I got:

Ooops…
Hey there! You have stopped by a bit sooner than we had expected. This feature is still being tested, so please check back later.

Luigi Montanez 17 Jan 08

+1 for adding OpenID/OpenBar into Campfire.

Kyle 17 Jan 08

Mike, you’re a smart man - exactly what I was thinking. Another reason I don’t believe in the OpenID movement - I just can’t see this ever working out for the end user.

DHH 17 Jan 08

Mike, there’s no weakening of the system because you have multiple forms of ID. Just like in real life, you may choose to use a driver’s license, a passport, or some other form of ID when you’re verifying who you are.

You just pick one to be the regular ID you use. In real life, lots of people just use their driver’s license (even though they COULD use their passport).

Richard, AOL and Yahoo has their own namespace. So you two people can be named “richard123” on both AOL and Yahoo and not conflict.

Chris Messina 17 Jan 08

This is certainly great news and should really motivate more folks to seriously consider adopting OpenID. While I agree that Yahoo should consider becoming a consumer, providing is the logical first step. Like telephoned, the more choices people have for who their identity provider is, the more competition and benefits there are.

Somewhat OT, but would you guys consider supporting OAuth (oauth.net) for delegated authorization now that identity and authentication are fairly well established with OpenID?

carlivar 17 Jan 08

Per this article:

“This is just the first step in working with OpenID,” Yahoo Director of Membership and Registration Raj Patel said to me on a phone interview yesterday. But he would not confirm when (or if) Yahoo would also allow become what is called a “relying party” (allowing users with third party OpenIDs to log in to Yahoo). He did say that the goal was to move in that direction, but gave no further guidance.

Sanat Gersappa 18 Jan 08

Here is a possible solution to multiple OpenIds -

http://simonwillison.net/2006/Dec/19/openid/

Berserk 18 Jan 08

DHH : there’s no weakening of the system because you have multiple forms of ID. Just like in real life, you may choose to use a driver’s license, a passport, or some other form of ID when you’re verifying who you are.

For most of us, the different forms of ID have identical name and other information (such as national identification number) making you uniquely identifiable. There is really no telling if dhh.37signals.com is the same as dhh.openid.org, or is there?

Is this a problem? I have no idea. It certainly is a way to not be the same person everywhere, for whatever purpose..

Chris Peters 21 Jan 08

“I just can’t see this ever working out for the end user.”

I long for the day where I don’t have 100 different username/password combos to remember.

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