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Comment by JohnFen | Hacker News Reader

I think I get what the article is trying to say, but I have to admit that bringing in the concept of "brand" seriously derails it for me.

My identity is not a "brand", the identifiers I use online are not a "brand", and I don't interact with "brands". I interact with people.

What I'm not sure about is whether I'm just having a reaction to the use of the concept of "brand" that is obscuring a meaningful and accurate point for me.

Now that I've written all of this, though, I'm not sure that I understood what the article was trying to say at all.

EDIT: now that I've read it a couple of times, I'm pretty sure that I don't understand what it's really saying. Can someone explain like I'm five?

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Your on-line identity consists of one or more brands and associated brand-specific identifiers. For instance, to me right now, you're HN!JohnFen. HN, or news.ycombinator.com, is the brand. Right now I'm speaking to you also using HN brand, as HN!TeMPOraL. HN is the brand through which the communication happens. I can't use my Twitter!TeMPOraL_PL account to talk to you, because there's no transport between Twitter and HN. And even if it was, now two brands would be involved in communication.

If you think about it, you'll notice that there's no way you and me can ever talk with one another without a brand intermediary, unless we accidentally meet somewhere physically, or unless some direct connection details could be exchanged through a chain of our physical acquaintances (essentially performing an IP routing over meatspace social network).

> I can't use my Twitter!TeMPOraL_PL account to talk to you, because there's no transport between Twitter and HN. And even if it was, now two brands would be involved in communication.

You could almost do it if things like the Keybase identity graph were widely used. It seems like that concept would lift the identity out of the brands. As long as you linked back to an identity chain from your identity on each brand.

I think I see what I was missing here -- he's talking about identity services, not actual identities. I see a large difference there.

In any case, thank you for helping to clear that up.

> If you think about it, you'll notice that there's no way you and me can ever talk with one another without a brand intermediary

I think that this is a matter of worldview or perspective. I don't see it that way at all, but I understand how others might.

The use of the term "brand" here is very confusing to me, as a brand is a constructed and projected image, not a solid thing. As another commenter here said, "institution" may be better. "Company" might be even better than that.

I think "brand" is used here because it's a bit more accurate than "company" or "institution". Consider an Instagram account and a Facebook account. Both are owned by the same company - though they weren't in the past - and yet they create their separate communication networks. What the author calls "a brand" can change its owner, and multiple distinct "brands" can be owned by the same organization. The example with Alice and Bob tells you that an individual can also establish such a "brand".

I don't know of a better term to use here.

Well, in the sense that you've explained, the article is talking about identity and communications channels as if they are related, so perhaps "communications channel" would be the most accurate term?

Not sure. Take the two e-mail addresses I still use; one is on GMail, the other under my domain. There are two "brands" (GMail and my domain), but one communication channel (e-mail).

(From my point of view, there are perhaps three "brands" - I own the domain, but the address under my domain is handled by Fastmail.)

Let me turn the question around: what about the author's use of the word "brand" seems to conflict with the usual use of that word? Especially when you include the extended meaning that gives rise to terms like "personal brand"?

The way the author uses that word intuitively clicks with me, but then again, I could be wrong about what the word "brand" means in general.

> Take the two e-mail addresses I still use; one is on GMail, the other under my domain. There are two "brands"

Hmm, I don't see email as an example of a "branded" communications at all. If we're exchanging emails, it doesn't matter to either of us who our email provider is. The identity is our email address, which is not necessarily linked to what email provider we're using.

> what about the author's use of the word "brand" seems to conflict with the usual use of that word? Especially when you include the extended meaning that gives rise to terms like "personal brand"?

A "brand" is a marketing thing -- it's the sum total of the iconography, art, marketing, and so forth of a product or company. It is distinct from the actual product or company.

I don't have a "personal brand" at all, because I don't market myself in a way that would require one.

This is clearly not what the author means, though, which is why I find its use to be confusing -- I don't really know exactly what he means by the term.

The author means brand to mean authoritative identity holder. It means an institution that 1) doesnt allow two people to use the same name and 2) at a very basic level will reactivity correct fraud

It is being used similar to the way we think of banks, as a provider of trust, and a custodian. Now that I think about it, custodian is a much better word than institution or brand.

I dont see either company as good examples.

I have or can have a single authentication identity to instagram/facebook and youtube/gmail/google. I might have a separate profile/persona on instagram/facebook or youtube/gmail but the sign in is the same identity. Yes instagram does have its own segregated identity infrastructure, but its identity brand doesnt get reused anywhere but instagram.

This article was about identification and authentication, not necessarily what you do with the services once you are logged in.

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