Who Attended:

Companies represented included Yahoo, Google, AOL, Microsoft, PayPal, Facebook, JanRain, Gamestop, Universal Music Group, Verizon, Salesforce.com, NRI, Digg, LinkedIn, Netflix, Amazon, Meebo, Mozilla Foundation, Ping Identity, and Protiviti.

Objectives:

The objective of this two day session was to:

1. Day 1: highlight areas where the technical community (OpenID Foundation, Identity Providers, technical platform providers) could continue to evolve and expand the functionality and benefits of User Managed Identity (UMID) to facilitate broader adoption and usage.
2. Day 2: provide a forum for technical collaboration to address specific requests from the market.

Recommendations:

Presenters during the first day included folks from Google, Digg, Facebook, Microsoft, Yahoo, LinkedIn, Netflix, PayPal, Amazon, Protivity, Meebo, NRI, Gamestop, and Universal Music Group. Eric Sachs from Google created a summary of the high level requests and recommendations coming collectively from the presenters.

1. Simpler protocol for simpler use-cases. OpenID is an extensible, robust technology that has a range of deployment models and application areas. To facilitate broader adoption and usage, we need to make sure that entry level applications and deployments can be as simple and straightforward as possible.
2. IDP whitelist/certification. There are applications and market segments where the organization accepting OpenID for registration and login has specific requirements, not all of which can be delivered by all ID providers. For those segments, it’s becoming apparent that there needs to be mechanisms for certification and/or whitelisting ID providers. The OpenID Foundation and Infocard Foundation have collaborated to form the Open Identity Exchange as a mechanism to certify ID providers to specific standards. The first application that OIX is pursuing is for Federal Government websites and the GSA/ICAM standards.
3. Non-browser app support. The “connected web” extends well beyond browsers on PCs to mobile phones, game consoles, TVs, set top boxes, etc. For example, at the Sears UX Summit, NPR reported that 30% of their traffic came from mobile access. OpenID and UMID needs to have solutions that need to span the entire connected web. Netflix in particular discussed the need for this.
4. Email as identifier. While picking from a visual matrix of ID provider logo buttons (Yahoo, Google, AOL, etc.) works well for many users and applications, there should be support for other UI paradigms like using an email address.
5. Additional attributes (Billing/Address/sex/gender/location/basic-reputation). Good progress has been made with Simple Registration (SREG) and Attribute Exchange (AX) to deliver a standard demographic data set including name, nickname, email address, gender, age, time zone, zip code, language, etc. However, not all ID providers support the key data fields yet, and some organizations would like to get additional data including billing/shipping address, some measure of reputation, etc. ID providers should look at ways to deliver more data (with explicit end user approval) to websites to increase the value proposition both to websites and their end users.
6. Consider other forms of UI enabled by a central discovery mechanism. There was discussion about how the UI/UX could be improved if websites could “discover” the preferred or enabled ID providers for website visitors. This central discovery mechanism doesn’t currently exist, but research and discussions are progressing to evaluate how this approach might work. Related to item #4, it’s worth looking at any approaches that can make the login interface more intuitive and scalable. One interesting example from Lee Hammond at Universal Music Group was that they are getting 89% of logins on the Lady Gaga website using UMID by an optimized Nascar approach that is more explicit about how users leverage existing accounts to login to the Lady Gaga website.
7. Best practices for sign-out, and quick switch between identities. Today most of OpenID workflow is focused on single sign-on, more thought should be put into optimizing workflows for single sign-out as well. For example, today logging out of Facebook Connect logs the user out of all websites that the user logged into with Facebook. Is this an optimal user experience, and if not, what should it be?
8. Whitelist/Certifying Relying Parties. While not on Eric’s summary list, another request was for the ability to white list and/or certify websites consuming data and services from the ID providers. ID providers like PayPal and LinkedIn who manage rich and possibly sensitive user data want mechanisms to ensure that websites consuming OpenID data are complying with certain standards with regard to privacy and security. For example, today PayPal is using a whitelist approach to the federal government websites that can use its ID services.

The good news for JanRain customers is that our products and services are already managing several of these requests and we’re working closely with standards bodies (OpenID, OAuth, Portable Contacts, Open Social, etc.) and ID providers to integrate these requests into future offerings as the services and infrastructure enhancements become available.

Thanks again to Microsoft and Google for sponsoring this great event.

Who Attended:
Companies represented included Sears, NPR, PBS, AARP, MTV, Fox News, Universal Music Group, Kodak, Tribune Interactive, White Pages, OpenTable, Scout24/Deutsche Telecom, GameStop, Bank of America, Yahoo, Google, AOL, Microsoft, PayPal, Facebook, JanRain, Exact Target, Ping Identity, and others.

Updates from the Identity Providers:
The session kicked off with presentations by Google (Joseph Smarr), Yahoo (Allen Tom), Microsoft (Angus Logan), Facebook (David Recordon), PayPal (Andrew Nash), and AOL (George Fletcher). Copies of many of the presentations are available on the OpenID Foundation wiki. Some key highlights from these sessions:

• Google is working on providing more API access to its OpenID Services, including Buzz, Portable Contacts, Activity Streams, OAuth WRAP, etc. Their OpenID service will also be certified by the newly formed Open Identity Exchange (OIX) for use on federal government websites.
• Yahoo has deployed an OpenID/OAuth hybrid deployment model for access control to Yahoo data and APIs including Contacts (address book), Yahoo Mail, and Yahoo Updates (Activity Streams). Allen went through a case study of how Yahoo OpenID and OAuth services are being used on Huffington Post and the many benefits to users of this experience. Allen described how Yahoo Updates allows posting back to 300M Yahoo homepage, 300M Yahoo Mail, 90M Yahoo Messenger, and 40M MyYahoo accounts.

• Microsoft reported that they have over 500 million active users across Windows LiveID, Bing, Xbox, HotMail, Messenger, MSN, and Office. They continue to making process in providing ‘standards’ based access to user data and services. Angus described how Windows LiveID is currently being used across Windows Live and Xbox. He also discussed MS’ active involvement in OAuth/WRAP, Portable Contacts, OWF, and Activity Stream initiatives.

• PayPal described their work with the federal government in launching an OpenID service for federal websites. Consumer policy and permissioning mechanism based on the UMA model will be integrated into the IDP operation. They are currently working with a limited number of “white listed” commercial websites for deployment of their OpenID services. Organizations wishing to discuss acceptance of PayPal OpenID on their websites are encouraged to contact Andrew Nash.

• Facebook discussed the widespread adoption of Facebook Connect and how they have been accepting OpenID for logins for the past year. They continued to share user experience learnings from building Connect and stressed the importance of developer simplicity around OpenID this year. David demonstrated a killer multimedia demo where a video feed dynamically consumed and displayed data from Facebook profiles via Connect.

• AOL reported that they will be upgrading their OpenID Provider service to V2.0 within the next few weeks. George discussed that they are pursuing a number additional enhancements based on emerging standards like XRD and webfinger. In addition, as an existing OpenID 2.0 Relying Party, AOL continues to expand the number of properties that accept OpenIDs.

• MySpace was unable to attend due to some last minute scheduling conflicts. Monica Keller, formerly an OpenID Advocate at MySpace has recently transitioned to Facebook and is now working with David Recordon on open standards initiatives.

Some History and Recommendations:

JanRain:
After the updates from the Identity Providers, Brian Ellin, Product Manager at JanRain, chronicled the evolution of OpenID UX. Brian made a number of recommendations to RPs looking to drive adoption and usage of OpenID registration and login:

• Simplify the login and registration flow – rethink the process and optimize it for a third party approach, don’t just bolt it onto your existing page
• Avoid lengthy registration forms. Engage quickly, progressively ask for data as needed. Import SREG, AX, and/or OAuth data where possible to pre-populate registration forms.
• Remember user preferences and present only the preferred ID provider upon return visits.
• Consider a branded button-driven interface, select the ID providers that are most relevant for your user base.
• Queue the users right at the register/login link with favicons or other visual images and text that makes it clear that they can use existing accounts instead of having to create an entirely new account.
• Placement of elements of the workflow on the webpage can impact adoption and usage
• Consider combining registration and login into one integrated service
• Use the OpenID UX extension for a pop-up interface that keeps the login process in the context of the host website – avoid the full browser redirect. Use check immediate mode when possible so user achieves a “single click login” experience.
• OpenID for mobile applications is great – less typing required, easier to import data for registration forms, no username/password to input. Don’t use pop-up for mobile interface.
• Use “verified email” from ID providers when available to eliminate the 2 step email verification registration flow that results in reduced success rates.
• Use the OpenID/OAuth hybrid for access to rich user data including friends, address books, photos, etc.

By implementing these recommendations, Blink182.com saw that 60% of users opted for 3rd party registration over the legacy username/password option. Through a finely tuned implementation that evolved through iterative testing, Universal Music Group’s Lady Gaga website was able to achieve an astounding 89% 3rd party login preference over the traditional username/password option.

“Voice of the Customer” – Input from Website Operators
Next up were Daniel Jacobson from NPR, Rob Harles from Sears, and Jonathan Coffman from PBS representing the “voice of the customer.”

National Public Radio (NPR):
Daniel Jacobson, Director of Application Development at NPR, was recently elected to the Board of Directors of the OpenID Foundation and as the Chairman of the Adoption Committee. He reported on goals and priorities of the Adoption Committee for the upcoming year. Daniel’s vision behind these goals is to help position OpenID as a product that will make it easier for website operators to implement while providing a better user experience for the end users. The top priorities supporting this vision include:

• Increased market research on the needs of RPs, OPs, and end users
• Enhancement of the open source libraries
• Marketing, education, and promotion
• Improved ability to serve non-browser-based platforms, including mobile

Anyone willing to contribute to the discussion on how to increase adoption and usage of OpenID may want to subscribe to the Adoption Committee mailing list.

Daniel also described the research that NPR has been doing with OpenID and that their “end game” is shared identities across all public media. They are currently collaborating with PBS and the OpenID Foundation to determine the next steps in their identity sharing strategy.

Sears:
Rob Harles, VP Social Media and Community at Sears Holdings Company, presented a summary of Sears recent deployment on the MySears and MyKmart communities as well as their plans to roll out across all the Sears websites. Rob was recently elected to the Board of Directors of the OpenID Foundation and serves as the Chairman of the Online Retailer Committee.

Rob reported that Sears has one of the fastest growing retail communities, with 400% growth in 2009. They deployed JanRain’s RPX integrated into the Viewpoints community platform to accept third party registration and login from Yahoo, Google, Facebook, MySpace, AOL, Twitter, Windows LiveID, and general OpenID accounts.

Additionally they surveyed their members to find out what drives interest in 3rd party login. The top two motivators were login convenience and the desire to not have to set up yet another username & password for a new account. When asked what would further improve user experience, the top two requests were the ability to share content and photos with friends.

Rob described their objectives as a combination of serving their existing customers better while also reaching out to a broader demographic than their traditional 35 to 53 year old female segment. He said that accepting registrations from a wide variety of identity providers definitely helped to expand their demographic reach.

Public Broadcasting Service (PBS):

Jonathan Coffman, Social Media Strategist and Product Manager at PBS, was also recently elected to the Board of Directors of the OpenID Foundation and serves on the Adoption Committee. PBS has launched an OpenID service for use across PBS websites.
Next steps for PBS include:

• Enhanced user profiles, including allowing RPs to store extended profile data at the OP
• Begin building out the consumer side of system, allowing users to connect with and use their 3rd party accounts across ecosystem
• PBS has teamed up with the OIDF to investigate what a Public Media Trust Framework, modeled after the US federal government trust framework, might entail
• Talking to Stations, Shows, NPR, and companies like Google and PayPal to envision a time when all of this might come together and to create a path forward.

Best Practices and Data Management

Finally, Allen Tom reviewed some best practices including account recovery/reset, attaching multiple identifiers, mobile authentication, and using WebFinger. Joseph Smarr discussed data management including updates on SREG, AX, OAuth, WRAP, Portable Contacts, and Activity Streams. Joseph acknowledged that there are a lot of moving parts and that things are changing quickly, so organizations who don’t have sufficient internal resources or expertise might want to consider outsourcing to a solution provider like JanRain.

What was especially memorable for this event was the active involvement, questions, and recommendations from existing and prospective OPs. Representatives from Sears, NPR, PBS, AARP, MTV, Fox News, Universal Music Group, Kodak, Tribune Interactive, White Pages, Scout24/Deutsche Telecom, and GameStop provided lots of constructive feedback for the OpenID Foundation and the Identity Providers.

Thanks to the Sponsors:

Many thanks to Sears for hosting the event, Google for providing video conference access from DC and Mt. View, and to all the participants who braved the Chicago weather and airport challenges to attend this exceptional event.

You can read more about the event on the OpenID wiki.

We’re especially excited that there will be nearly 50 participants in this event from organizations including:

Sears, Universal Music Group, NPR, PBS, Fox News, Tribune, Kodak, Meredith, MTV, AARP, OpenTable, Scout24/Deutsche Telekom, Whitepages.com, Republican National Committee, TwitterFeed, Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, PayPal, Facebook, MySpace, JanRain, WetPaint, Pluck, Viewpoints, Rainbow Media, NRI, Verisign, ExactTarget, Kantara ULX WG, Echo & Data Portability Project, and others.

As with prior events, the topics being discussed were determined by the participants, so we hope this will prove to be an interesting and informative session. Here’s a summary of what will be covered:

• Update from major Identity Providers on OpenID plans for 2010: Joseph Smarr (Google), Allen Tom (Yahoo), Monica Keller (MySpace), Andrew Nash (PayPal), Angus Logan (Microsoft), David Recordon (Facebook). Tentative: George Fletcher (AOL), Nico Popp (Verisign)
• How to drive adoption & usage of OpenID and the resulting business & end user benefits: Brian Ellin (JanRain) – lessons learned over the past three years implementing OpenID
• Input from Website Operators on how UX should evolve and goals behind those suggested enhancements: Rob Harles (Sears) & Daniel Jacobson (NPR) will facilitate a discussion and generate feedback from participating RPs to the OpenID Foundation and OPs.
• User experience flows for “OpenID Connect,” lessons learned from Facebook – David Recordon (Facebook)
• OpenID best practices including account recovery/reset, attaching multiple identifiers, mobile authentication, using WebFinger, etc. – Allen Tom (Yahoo)
• Data Management: update on SREG, AX, OAuth, WRAP, Portable Contacts, and Activity Streams – Joseph Smarr (formerly CTO of Plaxo, now at Google)
• Update from participating Website Operators on OpenID plans for 2010 – All RPs present who want to share some future thoughts and plans

We look forward to the feedback and insights from this event, and will be providing our summary of the take away messages on this blog, so please stay tuned…

In addition to making login as easy as a single click, UMID can simplify the process of setting up an online account on a new website. This process is generally referred to as “registration.” When you register on a website, you typically provide a name, email address, and maybe some of the following – nickname, gender, age, zip code, preferred language, time zone, etc. These “demographic” data elements allow the website operator to serve you better since they know a bit more about you.

As a registered user you can “personalize” your experiences on the website by setting preferences, saving activities, customizing the look and feel of the site, etc. It also then allows you to interact with the website operator and other people on the site via social functions like blogs, wikis, discussion groups, surveys, etc.

But here’s the rub, you have to re-enter a bunch of redundant information about yourself (name, email address, gender, age, language, zip code, etc.) on every website – tedious, error prone, and time consuming. So what if that same IDP (Google, Yahoo, AOL, Facebook, etc.) would let you, with your explicit permission, share that data with each website so you didn’t have to re-enter it at each new site? Well they can, its all part of the UMID service. And in some specific cases you might even want to share some pictures, a list of friends, your address book, your music/TV/news interests and preferences. That’s possible as well, but always and only with your explicit permission.

And the great thing is you can have all these benefits while at the same time reducing the risks of having someone hack your password, because you’re only sharing your password with your IDP, who is in the business of, among other things, protecting that ID. Companies like Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, AOL, PayPal, Microsoft, etc. are using sophisticated technology and procedures like the ones banks are using to prevent credit card fraud.

That’s not to say that every website isn’t doing the best that they can to protect your account. They are, but they don’t all have nearly the infrastructure that the major IDPs have, and you’re not sharing your password across hundreds, if not thousands of websites. For example, if you use your daughter’s middle name as your password on fifty websites, if someone figures it out on a local car dealer or newspaper’s website, they’ll then likely try that same password or something close to it on other websites that they think you might use. So your password is only as safe as the “weakest link” in the websites that you use.

And the problem is only getting worse. More companies, entertainment websites, non-profit organizations, government agencies, etc. are recognizing that the web is often both the most effective and inexpensive way to serve their customers/members/users. Individuals, especially in the younger generations, are also demanding faster, more comprehensive services 7X24 that can be best delivered via the internet. And in order to serve you better, each one of these sites is going to want you to register and login. So if nothing changes, you’re going to end up with more usernames and passwords, not less, as time progresses. This approach just doesn’t “scale” as they say in software development. Consumers need a better way to traverse the “authenticated web.” Companies have already figured this out with SSO solutions for their employees on their intranets, it seems logical that this should be happening on the open internet as well.

So now is the time to become familiar with UMID. Try it on some websites when you see it as an option. And if you become a fan, request it from the websites that you use. As more websites begin to deploy UMID options, and as more internet users demand it, we’ll achieve the momentum necessary to make this a standard part of everyone’s web experience.

• One out of five Web users still decides to leave the digital equivalent of a key under the doormat: they choose a simple, easily guessed password like “abc123,” “iloveyou” or even “password” to protect their data
• That suggests that hackers could easily break into many accounts just by trying the most common passwords. Because of the prevalence of fast computers and speedy networks, hackers can fire off thousands of password guesses per minute.
• Why do so many people continue to choose easy-to-guess passwords, despite so many warnings about the risks? Security experts suggest that we are simply overwhelmed by the sheer number of things we have to remember in this digital age. “Nowadays, we have to keep probably 10 times as many passwords in our head as we did 10 years ago,” said Jeff Moss, who founded a popular hacking conference and is now on the Homeland Security Advisory Council.

This article solicited over 140 comments from all over the world before the NY Times closed the article to comments in just several hours. The most popular responses gave suggestions on how to make your password management more intuitive and secure.

There were some great suggestions for how people can manage site specific passwords, but the bigger question is why should you need to have a unique username and password for every website that you visit? Most corporations have deployed an approach called single sign-on (SSO) to eliminate this problem for their employees. Once you login to your corporate intranet, you can instantly access sales, marketing, supply chain logistics, accounting, payroll, benefits, travel, 401K services, and a host of disparate web-based services via your corporate SSO identity – no unique usernames and passwords for each service.

Wouldn’t that be a great solution for people trying to access all their services on the web? Do you really need to have a separate username and password for your newspapers, magazines, phone company, utilities, airlines, college alumni websites, cable operators, hardware and software vendors, federal/state/local government agencies, car dealers, hotels, insurance companies, online retailers, etc.?

If you only had one or a few identities, it would be much easier and more practical to implement some of the article’s recommendations like picking a complex password or resetting it periodically. And what if someone was managing that password for you by proactively monitoring it to assure that it wasn’t being misused – using sophisticated technology and procedures like banks are using to prevent credit card fraud. Then imagine that you only have to login with that trusted password management service and your logins on all the websites you use are managed for you by one trusted partner. As a result, your password is never shared with other websites nor distributed across the web. Imagine being able to show up at the websites you use and just click on a button to login. No user name or password to remember for all those websites.

Well that solution is available today on over 9 million websites. The leading solution is based on an open source technology called OpenID which is being supported by Google, Yahoo, AOL, Microsoft, PayPal, IBM, Verisign, France Telecom, Telecom Italia, MySpace, Facebook, NEC, Mixi, and many others. There are also other vendor specific solutions by Microsoft, Twitter, and Facebook that provide similar functionality. The combination of these technologies is generally referred to as “user managed identity” (UMID). The general approach is that individuals create and manage their online identities by choosing one or more “identity providers” (IDP) like Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, PayPal, or Facebook to serve as their trusted agent for registering and logging into websites. You can read an earlier post summarizing recent developments in OpenID and UMID here.

So now is the time to become familiar with UMID. Try it on some websites when you see it as an option. And if you become a fan, request it from the other websites that you use. As more websites begin to deploy UMID options, and as more internet users demand it, we’ll achieve the momentum necessary to make this a standard part of everyone’s web experience.

See further comments here.

In the last couple of years, the “popup UI” has been developed as an improved user experience for signing in. Facebook Connect, for example, provides a window that pops up over the relying party’s page, and accepts credentials which get used to authenticate the user before the popup closes and the user is returned to the relying party page, now refreshed with user particulars if the authentication was successful. That was (originally) a non-OpenID implementation, but that workflow has been implemented by OpenID providers, too; last spring Google announced support for the OpenID User Interface Extension (aka “popup UI”), and JanRain’s RPX has supported Google popup UI since it came out.

Last week, Yahoo! announced support for popup UI as well. Relying parties can now take advantage of the improved user experience with the popup sign-in window for Yahoo! customers. RPX, of course, makes support for such improvements easy and automatic — RPX-enabled websites don’t need to change anything, as the these features are managed by RPX.

This is another step forward, but if you take some time to experiment with the different provider sign ins at an RPX-enabled site (try RPXnow.com or uservoice.com, for example), the sign in experiences are still mostly “page jumps”, redirects from the relying party page to the provider’s sign in page. This workflow is effective, too — it gets the job done — but lots of experience and user testing has shown this to be confusing, alarming even, for users, unsure of what just happened. It seems a small detail, providing a popup dialog versus a full page load, but this is an important detail in the ergonomics of sign in.

There are ways to “do your own popup UI”, of course. See this post from Facebook’s Luke Shepard for an example of how to wrap provider sign in pages in your own javascript-managed popup, or take a look at this appspot demo that uses OpenID User Interface Extension to provide sign ins without refreshing or leaving the page.

One of the imperatives for the marketplace success of OpenID and user-centric identity is to make a lot of this complexity transparent. Recommendations like Shepard’s are a good step forward from a “do it from scratch” approach for relying parties that want to support optimal sign in experiences for their users. But the best path to broad adoption and user conditioning for this UI is through active support for the major providers for the popup UI experience. With support for popup UI from the major identity providers, relying parties can deliver a consistent, clear process for users without a lot of development hassle.

Websites using RPX won’t need to do anything to take advantage of these improvements as they get deployed. The RPX service manages the workflow, and Yahoo! sign ins, which used to be “page loads”, will be “popups” for the user, with no work needed by the relying party to make it happen.

During two separate meetings with Vivek Kundra, the Federal CIO, he explained that a major priority for the federal government is transparency and “citizen engagement.” Accordingly, the government is aggressively pursuing open standard technologies that enable and support these objectives.

At the Gov 2.0 Summit in Washington DC, the General Services Administration and several government agencies announced their plans to adopt OpenID as part of the White House’s Open Government Initiative.

This announcement followed several months of research and discussion between the OpenID Foundation, OIDF member companies, the GSA, NIST, OMB, the InfoCard Foundation, and various government agencies.

The Identity, Credential, and Access Management (ICAM) committee of the GSA published its Identity Scheme Adoption Process, Trust Framework Provider Adoption Process, and OpenID 2.0 Government Profile documents over the last couple of months.

Initial identity providers include Yahoo, Google, AOL, Verisign, and PayPal who are undergoing certification processes defined in the TFPAP. The first wave of federal websites to accept these identity providers will include the Center for Information Technology (CIT), National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and related agencies.

This is an exciting development for OpenID that will provide significant benefits to federal agencies and the citizens that they serve by facilitating faster registration and login to online resources, while allowing citizens to provide timely feedback to the agencies that serve them.

If you’re interested in deploying OpenID on your website, you can find out more at the OpenID Foundation website or have a look at our RPX offering which is already being used by thousands of commercial websites around the world.

If you’d like to read some additional posts on this topic, please check out the following:

• PC Magazine
• ZD Net
• Reuters
• Wired
• Tech Crunch
• PC World
• Ecommerce Journal
• ReadWriteWeb
• Programmable Web
• Information Week
• Federal Computer Week
• Fast Government IT
• Channel Web
• eWeek
• Linux World
• Fast Company
• OhMyGov

With recent updates from Google, we are excited to extend our RPX services beyond the consumer web to offer easy sign-in to the millions of businesses, schools, and other organizations using Google Apps For Domains. Google now lets each of its customers enable OpenID provider support for their domain, which then makes it possible for members to sign-in to OpenID enabled websites using an OpenID from their own domain.

For example, we use Apps for Domains services here at JanRain, and can now simply type “janrain.com” to sign-in to OpenID enabled websites:

Typing our domain into the dialog box triggers the standard OpenID authentication process. The user is redirected to the appropriate Google Apps Domain to authenticate, as seen below:

Upon authentication on the first visit, a user will complete the transaction with Google by authorizing access to account information.

We’re excited about this for many reasons:

If you are interested in using Apps for Domains OpenID for authentication to your organizations other web services, we’d love to talk with you.

Retail sites including Sears and Kmart are making it easier for customers to write product reviews, post comments on thereviews of others, participate in discussion boards and post ideas for the community to vote on. Customers also have access to special offers andcoupons in return for their participation in the community.

Customer feedback service UserVoice allows customers across 19,000 websites to login with existing accounts from dozens of existing identity providers.
TwitterFeed feeds over 400,000 blogs to Twitter, simplifying login via RPX.

More than 85,000 websites from some of the world’s most recognizable brands to local TV and radio stations, and small businesses use KickApps to grow and engage their audiences with social media. For example, check out the Seattle Seahawks fan site powered by RPX.

Delivery service monitoring by TrackThis allows clients to track the status of packages from FedEx, UPS, USPS, DHL and other updates via Email, SMS messaging, RSS feeds, Facebook, or Twitter.
Online auction site Sulit.com of the Philippines makes it easy for customers to register and login to buy and sell merchandise.

Street Racersis a browser-based, multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) where its members race against other racers, participate in tournaments, and buy and sell cars and car parts. Kalydo offers game developers an open platform to publish their games on, free of charge with a transparent revenue sharing system, smart statistics and a personal approach.

Additionally, by offering a range of user interface deployment models, RPX can provide a full turn-key solution, a hybrid templated approach, or a fully custom interface.

We enjoy working with our customers and partners, some highlighted above, to assist them in achieving their online objectives and enhancing the experience for their users. Please let us know if there is something we can do to help your organization leverage the 3rd party identities of your users.