JanRain RPX is a hosted service that makes it simple to enable OpenID (Google, MySpace, MS Live, Yahoo!, AOL, ….) , Facebook Connect and even Twitter Connect on your blog. Visitors don’t have to register on your blog and remember another username and password, but are still able to use all the features on your blog. At the same time, you as the blog owner receive valuable information about your users. Profile information, email addresses, avatars and even friends lists can be passed on to your blog when someone logs in through RPX.

RPX offers a single API and works as a proxy between your website and the identity providers, and is transparent to the end user. Adding RPX to your website doesn’t require any changes to your database and is the ideal solution for Wordpress. With their Wordpress plugin it’s really just plug and play.

Why RPX?

Because there are several protocols in use by different Identity Providers. OpenID is not compatible with Facebook Connect (proprietary protocol) and Twitter Connect (OAuth) for example. Besides the differences in protocols for identifying, there are also different protocols for the retreival of profile data, media and friends. The Open Stack way with OpenID, Oauth and PortableContacts is just one way to achieve this. Facebook Connect is another, but there are even more protocols out there.

That’s why most websites and blogs choose one of those protocols and stick with it. Only some provide them all. RPX takes away the hurdle of implementing all the different protocols and makes sure that if one of the providers implements something new, you don’t have to. You have access to all current and future Identity Providers through a single Restful API.

Besides offering an API, JanRain also created RPX libraries for all common programming languages and are offering a plugin for Wordpress. Install the plugin, select which Identity Providers you want to accept and you are ready to go. The free version offers you login and 6 providers, the paid versions are offering profile data, avatar, email address and contact list import. The Pro version offers synchronisation, so your userbase is always up to date even when your users don’t login. The pro version gives you also the option to post status updates to Twitter and Facebook.

If you want to provide remote login on your website through Twitter, Facebook or OpenID, you should really take a look at RPX. Not convinced? Take a test run by logging in below and leaving a comment ;-)