Unpopular opinion (?)
@JamesGleick I deeply agree with the need. The downside is cost and infrastructure needed. For a federated service this gets tough and not only has requirements and costs at the center (in a federated model the center is squishy). But, this also puts added needs to the federated envrionment owners / managers.
But, still needs money resources to do this and that is not inconsequential.
That said, very much worth persuing.
Unpopular opinion (?)
@vanderwal @JamesGleick I think (hope) that building internal full-text search capability within fediverse code isn't being seriously contemplated. It's a complex and rarefied specialty requiring resources well out of application scope, and the infrastructure costs are... well, as you yourself say. Adding API integration with an external engine is a more appropriate solution from a separation of concerns perspective. And for just plain practical reason that it really wouldn't get done at all otherwise, let alone well.
