The significance of Yahoo's decision to back a universal registration system is being lost in reports I've read, which fail to recognize it's the foundation for any futuristic social networking master profile.

Regular readers know I'm expecting someone (maybe Google) will try housing all of your profile information in one place, and then folks will be able to update across all social networks at once: MySpace, Facebook, your local newspaper.

Yahoo is suddenly supporting OpenID, an open-source solution to housing profiles. An open-source approach would undermine efforts by Google and Microsoft to create their own system. Pay close attention to the second part of this quote on FT.com:

Ash Patel, Yahoo’s head of platforms and infrastructure, said: “Supporting OpenID gives our users the freedom to leverage their Yahoo ID both on and off the Yahoo network, reducing the number of usernames and passwords they need to remember and offering a single, trusted partner for managing their online identity.”

The important part is in bold. Managing identity could easily morph into the type of master profile I've suggested will emerge.

Yahoo isn't making this move out of the kindness of its heart; rather, Yahoo recognizes that it can't afford to let Google emerge as the home of user profiles. Competition for the throne of master profile keeper began with Windows Passport but is now being waged between OpenID, Google's OpenSocial and Microsoft's Windows Live ID. And if that profile is built on OpenID, then monopoly models from Google and Microsoft are scuttled.

Apparently that won't stop Google, which is now half-heartedly supporting OpenID. If OpenID finally fulfills the need for common registration, then the race will be onto the other things on my list or requirements to become the master profile.

What exactly is OpenID?