Why aren't lots of people using OpenID?

Question

Can someone please tell me why lots of websites don't use OpenID? Is there a disadvantage to using OpenID? Or is there something about the setup that website owners don't like?

Answer 1

Most people don't even know that they have an OpenID account and don't know what to do when they are asked to enter their OpenID. They get even more confused if you redirect them to a different site to login. It's a little worrying for people when they don't understand where their password is being sent. They may mistake it for a phishing attack and leave the site, or they may just decide that it's too complicated and give up without even trying.

If you present people with a standard "Register for an account" form with username and password then the majority of people will have seen it before and be familiar with the process.

Answer 2

Because most sites only accept their own OpenIDs ... while advertising the wondrous benefits of using their OpenIDs on every other site.

Answer 3

It would appear lots of people ARE using open ID.

As of December 2009[update], there are over 1 billion OpenID enabled accounts on the Internet (see below) and approximately 9 million sites have integrated OpenID consumer support.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenID

It's a relatively new concept and to further it's use on a large scale platform (the web) takes time, especially because the concept of registering/login hasn't changed for many years and the audience is currently comfortable and well educated on the old method.

Its benefits over traditional login are huge. For example, how many of us use the same password on every site? It only takes one bad site to collect usernames and passwords and say, try them out on banking sites to see if they can login.

Answer 4

Managing user accounts is deeply ingrained in the process of any web application. It is obvious that you will need it to manage your users. Managing other people's accounts is not so obvious, and you would probably not even think of it unless you have heard of OpenID before.

Except if you have an understanding for the needs of your users (not yet another user account) there is no strong motivation to use OpenID - from the business perspective of the operator.

On the other hand, many users are so used to manage a gazillion of user accounts (anyone here not using a password manager or -shudder- default passwords?) that they think this is the way it has to be.