Not entirely sure how possible this is, but it’s a pretty large pitfall I just discovered. If someone links a thread in a comment and I click it, my browser will open the thread in their instance, not mine. Therefore, if I want to interact with the post they linked, I have to copy it, paste it into my instance’s search bar, find the same post, and then open it. Unfortunately that’s a pretty far cry from the convenience of just clicking a link.
This is something we need to figure out, it shouldn’t be too complicated for instances to rewrite links and open the content “locally”. The option should also be a user configurable preference, and perhaps have an override method available. For example, hovering over the link will show a context menu with the option to open the post in it’s original instance (in the event your instance isn’t federated with it or you want to see it in the other instance for whatever reason).
If a plug-in is required then so be it. In any social media format, being able to easily interact with other users is absolutely necessary. For any platform to succeed, this can NOT be gated, or we’re cutting a huge part of the potential userbase out.
Having to do work to interact on something simple like this would mean cutting out: tech-inept users (including smart but older people), and people who are lazy about it (let’s be honest, this is most people)