OpenID is a Disaster; Seriously

It's actually much worse than you could possibly imagine. If you think we had security problems up until now, you ain't seen nothing yet.

OpenID was already the most confusing thing about surfing the web (help us Common Craft!), and now that I've actually successfully used it twice, I'm absolutely convinced that security experts the world over are going to shit a collective brick when they see what a disaster the actual implementation of this 'technology' looks like.

You start at some site - click a button - then you get sent to some other site - which doesn't look like any site you've ever been to, before - then you get asked some more questions - some of which seems to be semi-required to proceed - then you check a few more boxes and click a few more buttons, and 15 minutes later you end up back where you started - and the action that you performed 15 minutes ago is now magically completed. Or you get an error message like the one in the screenshot at top.

It's difficult to know who to blame in this catastrophe. Really, there is far too much blame to go around - no one corporation can possibly withstand the onslaught of criticism (and litigation) that we're about to see. This 'technology' is good enough to bring down entire economies.

OK, more realistically, this technology is such a strong contender for 'Worst Invention of the Century' that we don't have to worry about it getting any legs - not in the next decade, anyways.

Sometimes you just wish the grown-ups were in charge.