> that's what disqus wanted to be I see what you mean, but perhaps the key difference I see is that if this is a federated protocol, then you bring your own id

> that's what disqus wanted to be I see what you mean, but perhaps the key difference I see is that if this is a federated protocol, then you bring your own identity network (for example, someone in another sub-thread mentioned that Matrix could support this usecase). Presumably FB would implement this protocol if it was popular enough, and replicate FB comments, but the cipherpunks could use a Matrix server or whatever privacy-preserving method they prefer. By promoting it to the level of a protocol you can get multiple implementations/networks, but without forcing the communities to be un-discoverable to each other. (E.g. I might be fine with everybody seeing my public post, but prefer not to have every website capture my Disqus ID by virtue of me viewing the page. A bridged privately-run overlay could meet that requirement.) > webmentions[0] and bridgy[1] Perfect, thanks - that looks like at least the next evolutionary step towards what I'm envisioning. I think that until native browser-support is added (if it ever gets there), bridging posts back to "non-protocol-speakers" by posting comments to the blog itself is probably the smart move. That way you don't split your community. But I'd love to see a world where the comments and content are disaggregated, so that I can just filter out the garbage "public" comments, or participate in them, depending on my mood.