Dion Almaer, a web developer and former Palm/Mozilla/Google engineer, writes about web platform topics, webOS, and product engineering.
HN commenters mostly link it for specific older posts, such as his Steve Yegge interview on Rhino on Rails and a 2008 piece on email and passwords.
I agree about the three options - and I think (3) would have been the best outcome - because whenever this logo is used, it will most probably be shown as relatively small badge.
For example - this blog (http://almaer.com/blog/) is listed as an example of the logo in action on the launch page.
I think this page is a good example of my point; at this size, the logo suffers from the '5-becoming-6' problem - it doesn't actually communicate its message successfully at the most basic level.
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I've had a think about this in a bit more detail - and the more I think about it, the less impressed I am.
I think the whole concept should have been based around producing a mark that can identify whether a product supports HTML5 technologies.
I don't think the logo should have been produced to place on a site (or teeshirt) to show allegiance to the cause - I think it should have been created along the lines of the DVD, USB, HD or Blueray industry support logos.
An identity that helps promote HTML5 as a consumer technology - and shows a consumer at a glance, whether the product they are about to download or buy is capable enough to adhere to the upcoming spec.
But maybe that's what this is? Still, I'm a bit doubtful about whether it achieves these aims.
This is a great option for UX. Here's a fun old post from 2008 (from a former co-worker) on a similar topic: https://almaer.com/blog/its-just-my-email-password
You do want to make sure you add enhanced security around changing an account's email address (make them log in again, for example). The analog is forcing people to re-enter their password when changing their password in a more typical username/password system.
There was a some interest in something like that ("text/ruby" support via an applet + JRuby) a while back:
http://almaer.com/blog/running-ruby-in-the-browser-via-script-typetextruby
I remember hearing about it initially, but it doesn't appear to have gotten much traction.
I think this is the interview you're looking for:
http://almaer.com/blog/my-interview-with-steve-yegge-on-rhino-on-rails
As an aside, RingoJS (successor to Helma) is a nice server-side Rhino JavaScript framework.
HTML5 Drag'n'Drop: http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current-work/#dnd
Gears as a Bleeding Edge HTML5 implementation:
http://almaer.com/blog/gears-as-a-bleeding-edge-html-5-implementation
arguing about clojure vs. scala is the next big religious war
http://www.cio.com/article/print/454520
http://almaer.com/blog/the-next-big-language-theory-practice-and-the-killer-app