The document discusses how OpenID can be used to coordinate identity across formal educational systems and informal personal learning environments (PLEs). OpenID acts as a pivot to connect different identity systems without requiring them to be aligned or trust each other. It asserts a relationship between an agent and a URL in a flexible way. This allows OpenID to coordinate individual, self-organized activities in PLEs with resource management and other functions in formal learning management systems (LMSs).

1. OpenID and eLearning Scott Wilson institute for educational cybernetics university of bolton

4. Understanding education as a system

10. Distributed, user-owned technologies are not merely going to be grudgingly accepted by institutions, they are an inevitable requirement for organisational viability in the 21st Century

11. Far from threatening institutional viability and control, distributed, user-owned technology offers an escape route from escalating costs, liabilities, and bureaucracy that come from a supply-driven model Rather than spinning us out of control, they offer a way to get back under control

12. A supply-led approach to provision of education and provision of technology is no longer viable in an age of lifelong learning, user choice, and increasing numbers

13. Why is OpenID interesting?

14. it isn’t really an authentication system That’s a good thing

15. it doesn’t really verify identity or identify the user That’s a good thing too

16. it doesn’t require or assume policy alignment or trust Nice and flexible…

17. it isn’t a provisioning system (Apart from SREG and AE, but they aren’t mandatory)

18. All it does is offer a means of asserting a relationship between an agent and a URL how cool is that?

19. This makes it a potential boundary mechanism for the coordination of individual, self-organised, and managed activity

23. Thanks for listening - over to you http:// www.cetis.ac.uk/members/scott (that’s also my OpenID, btw ;-)