Author: Chris Smith Date: To: Conrad Wood CC: users Subject: Re: [bitfolk] Discourse vs. mailing list
> On 5 Nov 2019, at 15:57, Conrad Wood <cnw@???> wrote: >
>> Sadly I think the only thing keeping email alive is the fact that
>> almost every non-email platform requires an email address for user
>> identification and authentication. There’s a big shift now for
>> linking to Facebook and Google etc. for doing that, but those are
>> obviously very specific and platform dependent mechanisms, and even
>> those require an email address. Sooner or later there will be a
>> common, platform-agnostic mechanism that will become dominant, and at
>> that point I suspect email die.
>>
>
> off-topic, <random rant>: Most hipster apps require a phone number
> nowadays rather than an email address. Worse, they expect phone numbers
> to be allocated in blocks (e.g. mobile numbers with a specific prefix),
> as if VoIP never existed. Then they send SMS (!!!) as verification.
> IMHO that is way worse than an email address as identification. (sooo
> 80s!).
To be fair, if it’s an app then it’s likely on a smartphone and will have a valid mobile number. SMS in that situation is a very effective and pretty secure challenge-response method, particularly now that some phones can automatically recognise and input the verification number when it’s received.
> It's all quite rubbishy. Given all the data floating about on the 'net
> about us there shouldn't be any need whatsoever to log in anyways!
> Email is, however, atm, quite unique, as in, it doesn't require any
> prior connection between parties to communicate (good and bad - think
> "spam")....
> It also is 'owned' by the individual rather than a 3rd party. I own my
> email addressed, as in, it does not change when I change supplier
> (different to say phone numbers or google/facebook logins)
You have the right to keep your phone number when you change providers, so in that sense it is as ‘owned’ as an email address. Although at the risk of being pedantic I’d point out that for the most part email addresses (even self-hosted) and phone numbers are only rented, not owned.
I suspect it won’t be too long now before even phone numbers die out. We no longer need the in-built routing, so the number itself is just a unique identifier.
