One button sign up

I've stumbled across a new sign-up process: one button. That's it. From now on, the user will only have to click a button on all of my new projects to sign up.

"But Sam," you might ask, "How will you collect user information?"

Easy. Ask for it when you need it. If you only ask for the user's address when the user wants to do something that requires their address, then you have a carrot to encourage the user to give you that information.

If you ask for the address up front, then not only does the user have little incentive to give it to you, but you discourage the user from signing up at all

Take, for example, ebay's registration form:



Does ebay really need my address if I just want to watch an item? Requiring me to fill out all this information just to preform basic actions (like watching an item or searching closed auctions) discourages me from using the site at all.

Why not not create a "one button" sign up with a default user account and random username? Allow me to use as much of the site as possible, while asking for (but not requiring) information to gain additional access.

"But Sam", you counter again, "what if the user forgets their random username?"

That's easy, authenticate with cookies and/or a unique URL (see craigslist). At the same time, prompt the user (maybe at the top of every page) for a unique username or email address for logins.

EDIT: I've continued this discussion in my next post, One button sign up (continued)