President Obama's decision to release a copy of his birth certificate won't put an end to the stupid birther nonsense, but it does set a bad precedent.
This isn't a matter of needed transparency and disclosure. Today's release of the birth certificate tells reasonable people nothing that they didn't already know. There was already more than enough documentation that Obama was born in Hawaii and a complete dearth of evidence to suggest otherwise.
But any administration is going to have to deal with its share of conspiracy mongers. What happened today is that those theorists learned that if they're persistent enough, they can get the President of the United States to respond to them.
This will only inspire future conspiracy nuts to keep up the fight on their pet theories, whatever they may be.