I am glad they are embracing OpenID, the problem I have is how they are going about it. To make OpenID work, everyone needs to be on the same sheet of music. Google's new way is to have you enter your email address instead of your OpenID provider URL.

With that said, I do like the concept of your email provider being your OpenID provider as well, one less thing to remember (not that its hard to remember a URL), and after all OpenID was created to help consolidate the multitude of authentications that you already have to remember.

I am not a big fan of "embrace and extend" when it breaks the system down. If they wish to extend the way OpenID works, there should be a consensus within the OpenID community.

From the article:

Web 2.0 means using the web as it was meant to be used, and Google does. That's their secret. The web naturally has a certain grain, and Google is aligned with it. That's why their success seems so effortless. They're sailing with the wind, instead of sitting becalmed praying for a business model, like the print media, or trying to tack upwind by suing their customers, like Microsoft and the record labels.

Amen to that brother.

All in all, another really good read from Mr. Graham.