There's literally nothing in the proposal about an internet ID from the Commerce Department. While I'm not thoroughly convinced we need better identification on the net, the proposal here is about creating standards for stronger identification -- something like OpenID with the weight of the federal government trying to get industry, privacy and security groups in the same room. The alternative, it seems to me, is to watch Facebook corner the market on consumer identity, while defense contractors or the banking industry wins government contracts, and the latter eventually create some very badly designed system for citizens to log in to government agency websites.
While I'm also deeply opposed to any government-run program, that's not what's happening here.
I'm also a bit disappointed here with Hacker News. Folks here could easily imagine an internet that is easier and safer with a better way for users to manage their identities, while retaining both privacy and the possibility of pseudonimity and anonymity. Instead, mostly what's shown up in the border here is a Reddit thread with people saying, "You can take my anonymous internet but you'll have to pry the keyboard out of my cold dead hands." HN is usually much better than this.
"I'm also a bit disappointed here with Hacker News. Folks here could easily imagine an internet that is easier and safer with a better way for users to manage their identities"
I'm disappointed with you. Why do your values for a "safer and better" internet have to be imposed on me? Where is your objective data showing this will be a "safer and better" internet? Is internet use in Australia "safer and better" because they choose to govern and censor it? To me this sounds like the marketing-speak of the war on drugs and terror.
Furthermore, why do I need a federal program to do this? There are already identity management solutions and standards widely available, namely Shibboleth http://shibboleth.internet2.edu/, which is deployed across California State Universities and universities across the U.S. There is no reason it could not be leveraged for federated identity.
>"While I'm also deeply opposed to any government-run program, that's not what's happening here."
Pardon? Just because it is a private-public partnership does not exclude the government from ownership, but don't trust me, go read the source yourself: http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/ns_tic.pdf That is the draft from when it was proposed for DHS. You can see in the document itself the references to "accountability" of these private partners to the government in their "Identity Ecosystem".
While I'm also deeply opposed to any government-run program, that's not what's happening here.
I'm also a bit disappointed here with Hacker News. Folks here could easily imagine an internet that is easier and safer with a better way for users to manage their identities, while retaining both privacy and the possibility of pseudonimity and anonymity. Instead, mostly what's shown up in the border here is a Reddit thread with people saying, "You can take my anonymous internet but you'll have to pry the keyboard out of my cold dead hands." HN is usually much better than this.