I use a multi-layer authentication system with various levels of compatibility, security, and accessibility.
* The default mode is unauthenticated, which allows the user to post plaintext. Optionally, this can be backed by a device fingerprint, which would group all of this user's posts together. This is supported by all post-Mosaic browsers, except perhaps Mosaic 1.0, which does not support HTML forms. (For Mosaic, there is a fallback writing mode, of the form http://example.com/your+message+here)
* There is also a cookie-based authentication system, in which the user asks for a new ID, and the server sets cookies for user id and checksum. The checksum is checked against a server secret via hashing, so no storage of account data is needed on the server. This works with all cookie-supporting browsers.
* The other authentication system is based on PGP, and allows the user to either use in-browser PGP (insecure) or client-based PGP (less insecure) to sign their messages. These messages can be both client verified and grouped together into a profile on the server.