Technology and markets at IIW2007
I managed to stop by day two of the Internet Identity Workshop for a couple hours, and had some good conversations while seeing important specs come to life right there on the spot. Impressive stuff!
I had really wanted to attend the day three session on “The Business of Identity” initiated by Johannes Ernst, but I wasn’t going to be able to make it and so stopped by the previous afternoon.
One thing that’s clear is that the identity space is evolving to the point where the technologies are going to see adoption by web apps and sites as well as the larger companies that already are active users. I heard some pretty impressive news on this front from Andy Dale, but it doesn’t seem to be public yet so I won’t mention specifics here.
I do hope more folks keep thinking about marketing and how the profit motive can help drive the adoption of identity technology on the web. Great progress has been made in ensuring that these technologies are open, flexible, and not controlled by any one company or entity; but now that these barriers are gone, I think it’s time to start thinking about positive forces that can help to jump-start the entire identity ecosystem.
iiw2007