Re: Federation protocols

On 2013-05-31 13:37, Michał 'rysiek' Woźniak wrote:
> The whole world uses name@example.com

On 2013-05-31 12:50, Sandeep Shetty wrote:
> I think interop on the web should be based on URLs not email 
> addresses

Looks like a blocker, right there. Let's see if we can fix that! I 
propose a simple rule:

    "If it exists, then it is correct."

Do email-like identifiers exist? Yes, several systems use them. So then 
they are correct.

Do URL identifiers exist? Yes, several other systems use them. So then 
they are also correct.

See what is out there, and federate with it. Just federate with 
everything that exists, in the other system's native protocol (even if 
their identifiers look so funny to you) instead of trying to evangelize 
your "esperanto language" to them. I wrote http://useraddress.net:12380/ 
last year to explore that approach, and I think it can work.

I think in a polyglot mindset we should allow both email-like and 
URL-like identifiers, and I even think that it is the only way forward. 
If we can apply polyglot thinking at that most basic level of the user 
identifier, then we will also be able to apply it at all the other 
levels, and can achieve interop without having to discuss superiority of 
certain design choices over others. It is actually a beautiful thing 
that all our systems are so different and unique, that's part of the 
richness! :) Let's try to federate them with each other in a polyglot 
way.


Cheers,
Michiel

Received on Friday, 31 May 2013 12:37:17 UTC