I think I might have jumped the gun on this one. Ok, I did. It seems that for now, WordPress.com is only an identity provider and not a consumer, meaning that you can use your WordPress.com blog address as an OpenID but you can't yet log into WordPress.com with your OpenID. My bad.In talking to Matt last Friday at the Adaptive Path party, I asked him when OpenID was coming to Wordpress.com -- the hosted blogging service -- and he replied "Monday". Well, a day late but hardly a dollar short, Wordpress.com has added bi-directional support for OpenID. What this means is that you can both sign in to WordPress.com using your existing OpenIDs (making WordPress.com a "consumer") as well as use your WordPress.com URL (for example, http://factoryjoe.wordpress.com) as an OpenID elsewhere, making WordPress.com an iDP or "identity provider". The FAQ entry is pretty descriptive and I'd recommend you take a look at it. WordPress.com now joins a growing array of service providers offering support for this grassroots-driven authentication protocol. No word on when OpenID will hit core of the WordPress project, but there are already two great efforts driven first by Alan Castonguay and more recently Will Norris -- which point to a positive future between the two open source initiatives.


💬 Comments from the original post

Scott Kveton · 2007-03-06 09:36:55
Is it really bi-directional? I don't see the consumer support information in the FAQ there; I just see provider support. Would love to see consumer support!
maique · 2007-03-06 10:07:42
cool. i've been waiting for the oportunity to use my wordpresscom login as openid.
[...] [via factorycity] [...]
Rod Begbie · 2007-03-06 12:49:34
Yeah, I don't see any way to "log into WordPress.com" using my regular OpenID either. Shame really, since this now means that the Provider:Consumer ratio is even higher. (I personally have more OpenIDs than there are sites I can use them at, I think)
[...] Factory City) Share This This entry was written by Dougal and posted on 3/6/2007 at 4:36 pm and filed under [...]
dAniel hAhler · 2007-03-06 16:08:46
What's up? OpenIDs now get consumed.. :)
dAniel hAhler · 2007-03-06 16:12:10
OMG. I've mixed websites/tabs. Just ignore/delete my two comments.
[...] Chris Messina jumps the gun, assuming bidirectional support (i.e. producer and consumer), looks forward to further OpenIDness at WordPress, edits his post to remove the gun-jumping. [...]
[...] of Ning as just the highest profile company to offer bespoke social networking  and with the growing adoption of OpenID it feels like we’re moving away from the era of social networking hubs. After all, [...]

Wordpress.com adds support for OpenID