The OpenID communication platform Pibb opens up and becomes friendlier

Pibb, a comprehensive communications tool has launched some major updates today. The most important new feature is that you no longer need to login to see what the Pibb community is up to.  Simply go to Pibb.com and browse or search the channel directory for a topic that interests you.  Then click on the channel link or icon and you will be taken to the channel's landing page which will show all active threads on the right hand side. There is also a link to an RSS feed for the channel on the bottom left.

The other major update is the way they handle OpenID and this is an update I like. Basically AOL and LiveJournal accounts automatically have an OpenID account associated with them. Rather than having to remember a complicated URL for the account, just enter your AOL or LiveJournal account and Pibb will do the rest to get you to the login screen on the respective service. I hope they push this out so sites like CN can use it as well. They claim over 75 million OpenID accounts are "active." Now if they could just make the "nicknames" more friendly than: http://myspaceuser.myspace.com/billjones that would be excellent :)

I asked Michael Graves, Pibb CTO for a quote about these updates, "Pibb is a communications platform built on top of OpenID. As the single sign-on and social networking benefits emerge in the ecosystem that OpenID enables, Pibb will provide messaging tools to leverage those benefits in your communications.

"Consolidate your blog comments, chat, private channels and public forums, all taking advantage of the same social networking and identity resources that make portable identity and portable reputation useful for OpenID users. As the OpenID-enabled web develops, users will find increasing value in tools that facilitate flexible communications and connections between OpenIDs, and Pibb is a platform that will enable those features."

Check out my review of Pibb from earlier this year.