I just joined the OpenID foundation in order to take part in the current board elections.

I’m reading the mailing list traffic with interest trying to figure out which candidates I should support, which ones are going to provide the OpenID with the right mix of skills and experience to make it have even greater success in 2009.

For me there are a couple of obvious choices, Chris Messina is an incredibly smart guy.  As well as already taking several projects to widespread success (BarCamp, Firefox), he also has the right UX focus that I think OpenID desperately needs.

David Recordon is another obvious choice for me.  Having seen him speak at FOWA London, I found him smart and articulate, this is added to his obvious commitment to OpenID (and the rest of the open stack).

As for for my other 5 votes, well, I’ve got to the 24th of December to decide, so I’ll carry on lurking on the mailing lists.

If you too are interested in having a say in how one of the most important elements of the open web will be driven in the coming months, then et yourself over to openid.net and pay just $25 to beome a foundation member.  Worth every cent