Dave Kearns at KuppingerCole draws a parallel between ethernet and identity federation protocols, arguing that identity is improving by leaps and bounds, much as ethernet had to. He goes on to argue that OpenID Connect is a phoenix rising from the ashes of the now-defunct or siloed federation protocols that marked the first generation of “user-centric identity”.

I hadn’t, however, seen user-centric identity linked as closely with enterprise mobility and the cloud model:

It’s no longer called “User-centric” identity. Today’s term is “Consumer Identity” and it’s part of the movement called the “Consumerization of IT” (CoIT), which has evolved from the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) movement.