The following link relations are currently common among WebFinger implementers:
http://webfinger.net/rel/profile-page (for quickly getting the HTML profile page of a user without resolving their actor document and checking for the url)
http://webfinger.net/rel/avatar (for quickly getting the avatar of a user without resolving their actor document and checking for the icon)
Threads already requires HTTP Signatures for accessing the actor document, which means the actor document is effectively not public any more, and the WebFinger entry becomes more important for uses cases involving anonymous clients. I would argue making the actor files a bit less public is actually a good thing. So I would change the first sentence to say:
"The following link relations are recommended:"
... and the comments in parentheses to be replaced with a statement to the effect that it allows public access instead of being merely a convenience.
It currently says merely:
Threads already requires HTTP Signatures for accessing the actor document, which means the actor document is effectively not public any more, and the WebFinger entry becomes more important for uses cases involving anonymous clients. I would argue making the actor files a bit less public is actually a good thing. So I would change the first sentence to say:
"The following link relations are recommended:"
... and the comments in parentheses to be replaced with a statement to the effect that it allows public access instead of being merely a convenience.