we also thought about using something generic like `[email protected]` or `[email protected]` but this would have made autocomplete useless. Mastodon users would see a list of thousands of `blog` or `feed` users when searching for a WordPress.com user.

We have decided to do it like that, because it is an easy and nice way to have a unique ID that works with or without a custom domain.

For example: `[email protected]` makes only sense if you use the wordpress.com subdomain. If you have your own domain, you want to have something like `username@domain` not `[email protected]`.

Besides of that, you will be able to activate user-accounts (next to the blog-account) on higher plans. That means we had to choose something that is consistent but causes no collisions with usernames.

And finally Mastodon and others only show the part before the @, that makes the ID very similar to what Bluesky is doing. https://mastodon.social/@pfefferle/111220452911718192

I respect you and Automattic being transparent about your thinking here on HN.

I agree with all of your points! I started to build it as a pack of loosely connected plugins, because thats what OStatus is... a pack of combined open protocols...

With the actual structure you can decide if you want to use the whole pack or only single items and the complete OStatus pack will be compatible with all single plugins/specs.

I agree that the Name "OStatus for WordPress" is not that end-user friendly... but with a better name and a better installer it should be a good start!

If someone is willing to help, please let me know... Up to now it's only me working on all the OStatus plugins (pubsubhubbub, activitystreams, webfinger, salmon, ...)