Janrain
| Type | Private Startup |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2005 |
| Headquarters | Portland, OR, USA |
| Products | Janrain Engage (formerly RPX), Janrain Capture, Janrain Federate |
| Website | www.janrain.com |
Janrain Inc. is a privately held technology company based in Portland, Oregon. Janrain offers software as a service solutions for commercial businesses and websites to connect their sites to the social web. Janrain's flagship product enables a website's users to register or login with their existing social network accounts and share content from the site or their activities with friends on multiple social networks. The company has roots in the the OpenID community that date back to its inception in 2005.
Contents |
[edit] History
Janrain was founded in 2005 by Larry Drebes, who previously founded Four 11 Corporation (with RocketMail as its flagship product) and Desktop.com. The company developed schtuff.com, a wiki hosting service which would later be acquired by PBWiki in 2007.[1]
In 2005, Brad Fitzpatrick of LiveJournal developed the OpenID protocol. Shortly thereafter, Janrain became an active participant in the OpenID community and developed the open source libraries which today power the majority of the websites accepting OpenID logins.[2] The company also was involved in forming the OpenID Foundation, an organization seeking to advance the market for the technology.[3]
In 2006, Janrain created MyOpenID.com, an identity provisioning service that allows Internet users to obtain an OpenID. MyOpenID remains one of the largest independent OpenID Providers today.[4]
In October, 2008, Janrain introduced Janrain Engage (formerly RPX), a software as a service solution enabling websites to register and login users with their existing Facebook, Google, Yahoo, AOL, MySpace, Windows Live ID and Twitter accounts, and share content and site activities with friends on multiple social networks. Soon after, Universal Music Group announced the integration of Janrain Engage on over 100 music artist sites under the Interscope-Geffen-A&M record label.[5] In March, 2009, KickApps, a social networking platform, integrated Janrain Engage into its platform.[6] In July, 2009, Sears announced the integration of Janrain Engage onto its community websites for Sears and Kmart.[7]
In December, 2009, Janrain announced that it raised $3.25 million in venture capital funding to accelerate product development and market adoption for its social media and user management solutions. The funding round was led by DFJ Frontier, RPM Ventures and Anthem Ventures. [8]
The use of social login and social sharing tools has been particularly popular among media companies, and in June, 2010, The Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Meredith Corporation, The Dallas Morning News (a property of Belo), E. W. Scripps Company and National Geographic all began using Janrain Engage. [9] In November, 2010, social community platform Ning announced that it had integrated Janrain Engage into its platform to enable social login and allow users to invite their friends to join a Ning community site.[10]. In December, 2010, VentureBeat reported that MTV has integrated Janrain Engage for social login and social sharing across several of its websites, including The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, and VH1.[11]
[edit] Products
[edit] Janrain Engage (formerly RPX)
A turnkey social login and social sharing solution. Janrain Engage lets a website's visitors register or login with their existing social network accounts from Facebook, Google, Twitter, Yahoo, LinkedIn or other networks, and share content or their site activities with friends on multiple social networks. Additional functionality lets users import their social network profile data and invite their friends to visit a website.
[edit] Janrain Capture
A turnkey social profile storage and registration solution that lets websites collect, store and manage profile data from a user's social networking account. Janrain Capture also provides a registration system with branded registration screens, user profile pages and account management features.
[edit] Janrain Federate
A turnkey single sign-on solution that lets users register or login once for multiple web properties or partner sites.
[edit] References
- ^ PBwiki announces acquisition of Schtuff, the popular wiki service. Retrieved on 3 August 2009.
- ^ Hoyt, Josh (2006-03-15). "OpenID + Simple Registration Information Exchange". Danga Interactive. http://lists.danga.com/pipermail/yadis/2006-March/002304.html. Retrieved 2008-03-20.
- ^ OpenID Board of Directors (2007-06-01). "OpenID Foundation". OpenID Foundation. http://openid.net/foundation/. Retrieved 2008-03-20.
- ^ One Key Fits All. Retrieved on 3 August 2009.
- ^ Janrain Offers Distributed Social Options Galore, Interscope Geffen A&M Bites. Retrieved on 3 August 2009.
- ^ KickApps Embraces Facebook Connect And OpenID. Retrieved on 3 August 2009.
- ^ Sears makes it easier to sign in to its new online communities. Retrieved on 3 August 2009.
- ^ ID startup Janrain raises $3.25M. Retrieved on 31 January 2011.
- ^ LA Times and other big publications sign-in to Janrain’s authentication service. Retrieved on 31 January 2011.
- ^ Ning Partners With Janrain To Offer Social Sign-Ins To Users. Retrieved on 31 January 2011.
- ^ Take that, Facebook: MTV signs up for Janrain’s social tools. Retrieved on 31 January 2011.
