Why IIW? Google’s perspective

IIW is a really unique place and we are asking different members of the community to share with us what draws them to the conference and community that gathers twice a year in Mountain View. In the coming weeks we will be posting several different perspectives.  Eric Sachs from Google shared this first in our series of perspectives:

The Internet is evolving from a set of web-sites connected by hyperlinks to a set of web-applications connected via APIs.  Google’s original search business evolved from those using those hyperlinks to index the Web.  The Googlers who attend IIW are there to help build and evangelize tools that enables those web applications to connect via APIs.  Google offers many tools for developers to build web applications to help the Internet evolve.  These include tools such as Google Web Toolkit, Google App Engine, Google Analytics, etc.  The technologies discussed at IIW, such as OAuth and OpenID, are key tools for the latest generation of web applications.

Security is a key aspect of these API connections because in many cases the data being moved is private, as opposed to public.  Developers prefer for security protocols to be publicly documented and debated by community experts who will help find any potential security flaws.  Many sessions at IIW are focused specifically on these types of security evaluations by experts in areas such as cryptography including members of Google’s security team.

The IIW sessions on user experience are also critical, especially when it involves issues of privacy, consent, and control over private data.  While tools like OAuth & OpenID are powerful, they raise many user experience challenges, and so web-applications developers need information about best practices in those areas.  Google has made a large investment in publishing our research in that area.  For example, at the most recent IIW we announced openidsamplestore.com which is a fully interactive site to showcase the latest best practices for how to be an OpenID relying party.

Google definitely plans to continue to have a large set of attendees at future IIWs.  We are increasing the number of projects we are pursuing the area of Internet Identity.  We are also constantly on the lookout for people we can hire to help those efforts, so if you are interested, contact me at esachs@google.com

IIW #11  was a  Great Success!

IIW #11  was a  Great Success!

See the Notes for the Conference here on the wiki.

Values of IIW articulated by attendees & descriptions of what IIW is from the IIW blog.

Attendees can be seen on our registration page.

Blog Posts about the conference:

• IIW Fascinates Me by Darius Dunlap, November 11th
• IIW OAuth Enterprise BOF: Session Management by Phil Hunt, November 10th
• JSON Public Key Spec Results at IIW on Thursday by Mike Jones, November 9th
• Internet Identity Workshop #11 by Franco Travostino, November 8th
• Google, Dogs, ponies and relying parties by John Fontana, November 8th
• WS-Trust and SAML and OAuth, oh my! by Pat Patterson, November 4th
• Monica Wilkinson’s Activity Streams 101 session at IIW as told by Kevin Marks by Mark Krynsky,  Nov 10th
• Internet Identity Workshop Wrap Up by Jan Rain November 5th
• Essential Characteristics of a Personal Data Store by Phil Windley, November 2
• Activity Streams 101 Session at IIW by Monica, November 2

IIW Europe #1 was October 11th in London prior to RSA Europe.  It was a big success we had 80 people in attendance and 50+ sessions.  Notes can be seen here on the wiki.

IIW Values

During the Opening Session of IIW on Tuesday November 2nd we asked participants to write down what they thought the values of IIW are.  This is the wordle cloud. We will also find other ways to present the values.

Here are some of the sentences that people wrote:

Bring consensus on some uniformity.

Collaborative Thinking on Industry Standards

Integrating technologies with practice and acceptable use.

Working in the wild.

Openness + fusion of ideas across institutions on a hard problem.

Engaging and open to ideas.

Inter industry exchange with peers.

Sharing Diverse Perspectives

Anti-Bullshit

Human-Centered

Empowered Individuals

Close on decisions faster then e-mail.

See old friends in the ID industry, meet new ones.

Defining a structure so that commercialization can thrive.

Get a glipse of topics that aren’t on the radar yet.

Get a better idea of where identity is going (and not going)

A new business opportunity Seriously the ability to share information with who/what (and ONLY who I want) when I want and transact with them, with trust.

An alternative approach to bringing ID people together to share and explore new ideas.

Making Shit Happen

Connecting smart people who care about identity.

Developing & Increasing Adoption of identity-related standards that make it possible for an end-user to have control of their own information and where its used.

Informed Exchange of Opinions

Getting people out of our commercial centric bubbles to focus on the progression of identity tech.

Bringing together diverse communities

Bottoms-up progress

Open collaboration to make the web better

Consensus Building

Brainstorming of ideas + concepts

Meeting Industry thought leaders

open discussion about current topics

Support the “Little Guy” (end-user & implementor)

Redefining internet experiences

News about the most recent technologies

Consistency of identity from UX builds widespread trust.

Make identity secure and easy to use

Standards to solve problems not just driving agendas.

Growing Consensus

Promoting the adoption of identity management standards

To get the common solution for identity sharing and make it into the standards in the industry across many big famous companies.

Do what’s right for our customers

Open for All

Discussion with Expanded Circles

What is IIW?

At the close of IIW 11 we asked the closing participants on November 4th to complete the following sentences. As a result of today/this conference… OR IIW is….these were all the results.

IIW is the meetings space where the user centric identity community invents the future.

IIW is where technology and humanity join forces.

As a result of today I feel that efforts from the past 6 years of IIW “plumbing” + “philosophical” discussion may be yielding value for consumers, business and startups.

As a result of this conference I have a deeper understanding of the technical challenges and opportunities in creating end-user value. (Browser, device, Internet search sites) & the new business models that will launched.

As a result of this conference I understand PDS/PDX more and believe we are on the verge of having a a whole bunch of businesses around it.

IIW is an amazing collection of people, ideas, passion and perspective about very important issues, technology and its fun.

IIW is a workspace and venue where thought leadership is developed on the key concept social, media and online activity: personal identity management.

As a result of this conference I will build a personal data store (for my fluffy cat).

As a result of this conference I’m going to create an initiac implications map/starting points for scenarios on the future of personal data stores.

As a result of this conference, I am convinced that IIW is both a business and civic opportunity.

As a result of this conference, I now have way to many ideas for what to do next.

IIW is still the highest signal-to-noise conference that I have ever found.

AS a result of this conference I know much more about internet identity and the people driving its future.

IIW is a great collaboration to understand the value of our digital footprint.

IIW is a place for everyone (competitors, friends) to discuss and solve problems that hold us all back from the future we desire.

As a result of this conference, I’m encouraged to work harder on identity solutions that make the web better for the user.

IIW is a place to learn the breadth of the meaning of identity.

IIW is great and should tour around the world

IIW is the best conference there is.

IIW is always awesome.

IIW is fun.

IIW is fluffy.

IIW is unconventional

As a result of today I came closer to closing a business contract!

I learned about OpenID and OAuth & see better how they relate to the work I’m doing in the enterprise identity space.

IIW is biased toward technical discussions.

As a result of this conference I am seriously pursuing deployment of activity streams, OAuthZ, OpenID ABC and some other cool stuff into my environment in the near future.

As a result of this conference I’ve been able to complete the circle on OAuth, OpenID or at least fill in some blanks.

IIW is interesting internet wonks

As a result of today I learned of firesheep and how to make a new session delay which is not vulnerable in this way.

IIW is? two parts I an one part I.

IIW is improv for web specs “yes, and.”

As a result of today, I’m burned out…(perhaps) IIW is to long?

I am exhausted but better off for it.

As a result of this conference my network of brilliance has massively expanded.

IIW is the best excuse for a spec drama ever.

IIW is helping my identity crisis.

IIW is where I lost my corporate identity.

As a result of IIW I found my tribe.

As a result of the conference I get to know great identity people.

IIW is amazing.

IIW is the Switzerland of Silicon Valley.