I entirely agree with this, JoAnn, and the previous paragraph.

A gripe about the Medium interface I have expressed eslewhere is the way that comments and threads are by default hidden, and never possible to open in a genuinely intuitive and user-friendly manner.

The comments should be where the story truly comes to life, through the interaction between writer and readers, and among readers.

The interface doesn't seem to encourage or facilitate that.

Highlighting and linking comments is a fantastic feature - I just wish that it stood out more, with different pane arrangement and display options, at least when using a desktop monitor.