Growing a Commons Worthy of Trust
by Joel Getzendanner, Trustee, Identity Commons

We assume readers of this article have an acquaintance with the theory and practice of Open Source software development, a good technical understanding of the Internet’s function and operation, and an exposure to and perhaps an interest in implementing OASIS XDI protocols (www.xdi.org). You have heard people fiercely argue about the relative benefits of one approach over another. You probably have started some of those arguments. All of that knowledge will come in handy in understanding what follows.

The Identity Commons is an attempt to unleash the power of self-determination, self-organization and self-governance in service of creating a system of identity and information exchange that is worthy of the trust of those who participate in it. 

This is no small task, and it has required us abandon conventional notions of organization and instead apply to this question the most current thinking of distributed systems design. Many of you are right at this cutting edge.  We're counting on your help.  It also has forced us to try to practice what we preach.  We hope that you see that we have at least made an honest effort to do so.

Of course, we want all of you to join us in creating this trustworthy system, but we understand that it is hard for you to commit to it without understanding more of what you might be getting yourself into.  Therein lies the primary purpose of this article.  In it, we will discuss:

• A summary of the organizational architecture for a distributed membership corporation.

• How the Identity Commons and XDI.ORG are intending to implement this architecture.

• A brief discussion of some the advantages and benefits.

• A quick outline of how to get involved.

We don't expect this article to answer all of your questions.  This will always be a work in progress.  But we hope that it will provide a starting point for moving ahead with the work that we all know needs to be done.

(Continue to Organizational Architecture )