I often get the feeling that I’m always a step or two behind leading edge wisdom. I recently blogged about mashups. I’m sure that many of you who read that article had deep thoughts about mashups long before I did. I’m still learning.

But since my last mashup post, I realized that I had yet to find a mashup that is really Identity enabled. All mashup sites I had visited had no notion of who I was or what I wanted out of life. But I realized that four out of the five mashups I proposed in my previous article would require integrated Identity. I spoke of “my health insurance plan,” “articles I read,” “my current business travel itinerary,” and “customers for which Iam responsible.” Without realizing it, I had made a case for producing Identity-enabled mashups.

In the spirit of learning what others may have been thinking about Identity enabled mashups, I revisited the programmableweb mashup site again this morning. It is fun just to poke around and find new mashup ideas that people have implemented. I particularly like the new Detroit Tigers Map – perhaps because I’m not a big Yankee’s fan, despite Derek Jeter’s fantastic performance in game one of the playoffs.

On a whim, I visited the intersection of Google and YouTube on the mashup matrix. I figured that if Google and YouTube can mashup their corporations, I might find something of interest. Voila! I found an Identity enabled mashup, blueorganizer, a Firefox extension that claims to “help you personalize your web experience based on what you already like. It harnesses your information to help you discover relevant new information and save time.”

Note the emphasis on “you.” When I downloaded and installed the extension, the first thing I was asked was to establish an account. Blueorganizer is supposed to help me find things I really like, based on my browsing experience. It should be interesting to see how it really works over time.

The concept of mashups is intriguing because multiple services are combined in unique ways to provide a richer user experience than an un-integrated string of services could. Identity enablement is intriguing because it allows services to be tailored to meet individual needs. Combining identity with composite services provides a powerful means of delivering online value to individual users.

Identity-enabled mashups is a concept whose time has come.

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blueorganizer