[okfn-discuss] Open Service Definition (revisited)

Thu Aug 23 06:25:04 UTC 2007

On Tue, 2007-08-21 at 17:28 -0400, Luis Villa wrote:
> On 8/21/07, Mike Linksvayer <ml at creativecommons.org> wrote:
> > > An open service definition, I believe, should seek to
> > > define systems which meaningfully/practically transfer control back
> > > from service providers to users, not merely give them access to source
> > > and data.
> >
> > Presumably that means user controlled/transferable names.
> 
> names->identity, really.
> 
> Which is hard, but I've started talking a bit to some identity folks,

AFAICT the identity folks are not focused on the part that would
transfer power back to users -- delegable service addresses.  The
technology required is ancient -- owning your own domain -- and often
used to transparently and relatively costlessly move between low level
service providers (eg email).

> and it isn't undoable- openid-like systems (or more appropriately,
> email-like systems which allow forwarding and delegation of identity)

OpenID and the like are fine, but marginally relevant.  I'm far more
interested in being able to tell the world where I want them to access
"my" service (eg imagine images.mike.com, powered by flickr) than being
able to tell my service provider how to tell who I am.

> are still rare but are becoming more common and could be baked in from
> day one if people were very serious about it. (Unlikely that you'd
> want to bake that into the license or definition, but it bears
> thinking about.)

It may have no place in a definition, but "can I transparently move,
without cooperation (apart from data access) from my service provider"
is a pretty important consideration for anyone who wants to keep control
rather than cede control to service providers.

-- 
 http://wiki.creativecommons.org/User:Mike_Linksvayer